Manchester United will discover their route to June’s Champions League final in Madrid on Friday when the quarter-final and semi-final draws take place in Nyon.
United’s involvement in the draw appeared unlikely 10 days ago but their comeback victory against Paris Saint-Germain means they are one of four Premier League teams still in contention to lift the trophy.
Liverpool, City and Spurs are the others after their respective aggregate wins against Bayern Munich, Schalke and Borussia Dortmund.
Juventus, Ajax and Porto all produced second-leg comebacks in their round-of-16 fixtures to book their places in the draw, with Barcelona making up the octuple.
On paper, the best-case scenario for United would be a two-legged quarter-final against Porto, with the second game at Old Trafford, and with the winner of that game facing either Spurs or Ajax in the last four.
Porto haven’t reached the semi-finals of the Champions League since they won the competition in 2004 and their squad is the weakest of the eight left in the competition.
Despite both sides’ impressive last-16 showings, the prospect of playing either Spurs or Ajax in the semi-final wouldn’t be daunting.
It is more difficult to pinpoint a definitive worst-case scenario but a quarter-final against Manchester City followed by a semi-final against either Liverpool, Juventus or Barcelona would provide a sizeable obstacle for United on the road to Madrid.
City are the competition favourites, Liverpool are yet to lose a European two-legger under Jurgen Klopp, Juventus have Cristiano Ronaldo and Barcelona have Lionel Messi.