Wolfsburg’s Ricardo Rodriguez and Naldo after the game.

DPA
Berlin

Borussia Moenchengladbach and VfL Wolfsburg have joined Bayer Leverkusen in lamenting bad luck in 2-1 Champions League defeats after leading against strong opposition.
Gladbach were a minute away from holding Manchester City but then conceded a ninth penalty in 10 official matches this season to lose out Wednesday.
Wolfsburg could not hold on to their early lead at the other Manchester side, United, the day after Leverkusen were beaten by title holders Barcelona from two goals in the last 10 minutes.
The pain was especially felt in Moenchengladbach after their first home game in the elite event since 1978. “The penalty in the final minute is obviously a dagger through the heart,” captain Granit Xhaka said.
Winger Patrick Herrmann said: “I can barely put into words the disappointment we’re feeling after losing the game the way we did in the last minute.”
“We attacked well and had a lot of promising chances that we unfortunately couldn’t put away. We were brutally punished for that right at the end. Even though we lost, I think we put in a fantastic performance that we can be proud of. We showed that we can hold our own with the top teams in Europe, and we need to build on that.”
The hosts saw Raffael’s penalty saved by England keeper Joe Hart who also denied several further opportunities before Gladbach led from Lars Stindl. But City levelled and clinched the win from Sergio Aguero’s spot kick.
“Our performance was extremely impressive, so the result is naturally very hard to take,” caretaker coach Andre Schubert said, but added that “we must talk about the many penalties we concede.”
Gladbach now play in the Bundesliga against Wolfsburg who felt the same Wednesday after their early lead from Daniel Caligiuri at Old Trafford was to no avail as United won from Juan Mata’s penalty and Chris Smalling early in the second half.
It was a feeling of deja vu as Wolfsburg had also lost 2-1 after a 1-0 lead when they played United in the group stage six years ago.
“We played a really good away game and started very well with the goal, but then we had a phase during which it became very clear that United can really cause a problem with their attackers,” coach Dieter Hecking said.
Defender Naldo struck one positive note, saying “What we can take from this game is that we were absolutely determined to win.”
While Gladbach face an uphill battle with zero points, Wolfsburg have all chances on three points, and so do Leverkusen who could simply not believe they didn’t win at the Nou Camp.
Kyriakos Papadopoulos put Bayer ahead but like the others they were then punished for missing further chances as Barca hit back from Sergi Roberto and Luis Suarez in the absence of Lionel Messi.
“As stupid as it may sound, we should have beat them,” Bayer’s Germany midfielder Christoph Kramer said.
Sports director Rudi Voeller added: “The unbelievable thing is that we didn’t have just one or two chances. Normally only Bayern Munich are able to deal with Barcelona in such a way.”
Munich for their part were the only German team to win in mid-week, a 5-0 demolition of Dinamo Zagreb, for a maximum six points.