(Football news) Kylian Mbappe and Lionel Messi were on target as Paris Saint-Germain's near-perfect start to the season continued with a 3-1 win against Maccabi Haifa in the Champions League. Messi cancelled out Tjarron Chery's surprise first-half opener after being set up by Mbappe as the Argentinian wizard returned the favour for the french forward after the break before Neymar grabbed a third goal as PSG were made to sweat by the Israeli champions. Haifa increased the pressure when Dolev Haziza whipped in a perfect cross for Chery, who stretched out his leg to easily beat Gianluigi Donnarumma and put the hosts ahead.

PSG in the first half struggled to find their rhythm but Mbappe beat two defenders in the box and his cross was deflected into the path of Messi, who easily made it 1-1 eight minutes before the halftime break. With that goal Messi has now found the back of the net against a record 39 different teams in the Champions League. PSG initially were too passive after the interval, allowing Haifa more and more chances but the team’s individual talents eventually made the difference as Neymar wrapped the match in clinical fashion on a counter-attack after collecting a fine pass from Marco Verratti two minutes from time to end an 11-match run without a goal for the Brazil forward in the Champions League.

Mbappe, however, admitted his team's performance was far from perfect. "The pitch was not great but that's not an excuse. We made some adjustments after the break and it paid off. But we've got to work hard to get results in terms of the way we play because we've got some big games coming up."

Napoli stayed on top of their UCL group as Matteo Politano's penalty and late strikes by new signings as Giacomo Raspadori and Tanguy Ndombele sealed a 3-0 victory over 10-man Rangers at Ibrox and maintained their unbeaten start. Politano opened the scoring in the 68th minute, having taken over penalty duties from Piotr Zielinski who was denied twice from the spot by Rangers goalkeeper Allan McGregor in the second half.

Zielinski's first tame penalty was saved by McGregor before Politano reacted sharply to slide the ball home but VAR ordered the penalty to be retaken for encroachment by the Napoli forward line. Veteran McGregor, who had replaced the injured Jon McLaughlin for the game, dove to his left to deny Zielinski again but the home fans were silenced as Napoli continued to attack and Raspadori and Ndombele sealed the win and made it two wins out of two in the group. 

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