Milan, Barca and Man Utd eye Champions League progress

Following the slip-ups by Real Madrid, Valencia and Arsenal on Tuesday, Barcelona, Manchester United and AC Milan are the next in line to try to secure qualification for the second phase of the Champions League.

Real and Valencia both gave away late equalisers to draw 2-2 with AEK Athens and Basel respectively while Arsenal surprisingly lost 2-1 at home to Auxerre on Tuesday to all miss the opportunity of guaranteeing a place in the second phase with two games to spare.

Barcelona, overshadowed by their fellow Spaniards in Europe in recent seasons, have started with three wins out of three and will expect to make it four when they host Lokomotiv Moscow in Group H.

Barca eased to a 3-1 win in Russia three weeks ago and even though they looked off form in Sunday's 2-1 league defeat to Valladolid they should comfortably get the win to take them through.

Galatasaray, second on four points, face an awkward trip to Club Bruges, second on two, in the other Group H game.

AC Milan, flying high at the top of Serie A, will also look for a fourth successive win to ensure qualification from the tough group G.

Impressive back-to-back away wins over Deportivo Coruna and Bayern Munich have given Milan an unexpected cushion.

They will probably have to take on the Germans without Brazilian World Cup winner Rivaldo after he picked up a knee injury in the weekend's 4-1 win over Atalanta.

Munich, the 2001 champions but currently with just one point from nine, are on the brink of an early exit but are not short of confidence for a game they must win.

"We are going to Milan to win and I'm absolutely convinced we will win," said goalkeeper Oliver Kahn.

Deportivo will hope to repeat their 3-1 home win over RC Lens in France to move to nine points, enough to go through if Bayern do not win at the San Siro.

Manchester United thumped Olympiakos Piraeus 4-0 at Old Trafford on October 1 to take control of Group F.

They have nine points while Maccabi Haifa, Olympiakos and last year's runners-up Bayer Leverkusen all have three.

United should not have too many problems in Greece, even without injured striker Ruud van Nistelrooy, though they would probably be content with a draw.

Leverkusen, a shadow of the team that lost to Real in last season's final, are slowly getting back on track and a second successive win against Haifa would give them a chance of progress that looked unlikely when they were thumped 6-2 by Olympiakos in their opening game.

Group E leaders Juventus cannot quite clinch qualification but a victory at pointless Newcastle United would leave them all but through.

Newcastle's first foray into the Champions League has been a chastening one but manager Bobby Robson and the St James' Park fans will not want to see them fall to a fourth successive defeat.

Feyenoord, second on five points, and Dynamo Kiev, third on four, meet in the group's other game in Kiev.