Manchester City recorded their biggest win in the Champions League as they thrashed Shakhtar Donetsk – but an injury-time goal in the other group match meant they must wait to secure qualification for the last 16.
Pep Guardiola’s side are top of Group F and were heading into the next phase, until 10-man Hoffenheim came from 2-0 down and scored a 92nd-minute equaliser to draw 2-2 with Lyon.
But City will qualify as group winners with one game to spare if they beat Lyon in France on Tuesday, 27 November.
A hat-trick from Gabriel Jesus, including a bizarre penalty, and goals from David Silva, Riyad Mahrez and Raheem Sterling gave City a 6-0 win, eclipsing their 5-0 away success against Steaua Bucharest in the first leg of a play-off tie in August 2016.
How the goals went in
City captain Silva opened the scoring with a tap-in after Mahrez had twisted to create space for a low cross, before the hosts doubled their lead in strange circumstances.
Sterling fell over as he kicked the ground under no challenge and referee Viktor Kassai wrongly awarded the penalty, which Jesus converted for the first of his three goals.
There was no doubt about City’s third goal as Sterling ran at the visiting defence and curled a shot past goalkeeper Andriy Pyatov from the edge of the penalty area.
Kassai did get one penalty decision correct as Silva was clumsily brought down by Taras Stepanenko before Jesus scored his second penalty of the evening to make it 4-0.
Mahrez then did well to control a pass from Ilkay Gundogan on his chest and shooting past Pyatov for City’s fifth goal, before Jesus sealed his hat-trick from Mahrez’s pass.
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That looked to have been enough to take City into the knockout stages of the competition for a sixth successive season before Hoffenheim’s late equaliser cut the celebrations short.
A laughable penalty
The main talking point came in the 24th minute when Kassai – who refereed the 2011 Champions League final, in which Barcelona beat Manchester United 3-1 – stunned both City and Shakhtar by awarding a penalty.
England international Sterling had raced into the area and was a few yards clear of Shakhtar defender Mykola Matviyenko. As goalkeeper Pyatov came off his line to narrow the angle, Sterling went to shoot but kicked the ground and tumbled over.
Sterling did not appeal for a penalty and Pyatov started laughing when he saw it had been given. City boss Pep Guardiola appeared to tell the fourth official that it was the wrong decision.
Nevertheless, Jesus converted the spot-kick – his first goal in seven club appearances – to end the game as a contest and from then on it became a question of just how many they would score.
City won 3-0 away against Shakhtar on 23 October and they doubled that score against a Shakhtar side that were completely outclassed by the Premier League leaders.
