Celtic welcome European royalty to Parkhead on Wednesday, as Bayern Munich visit Glasgow for the first leg of a play-off for the Champions League last 16.

This tie sees two league leaders go head-to-head – Celtic are 13 points clear of Rangers in the Scottish Premiership, while Vincent Kompany's Bayern hold an eight-point advantage at the summit of the Bundesliga.

But neither of these sides found it easy to transfer that domestic dominance to the European stage this term.

Celtic finished 21st in the league phase, three points and nine places behind Bayern.

It has set up an intriguing contest over two legs, and here, we use Opta data to preview Wednesday's meeting.

What's expected?

Bayern came out on top in 48.2% of the Opta supercomputer's 10,000 data-led simulations.

Celtic have a win probability of 27.7%, while the threat of a draw is 24.1%.

The Hoops have faced Bayern on four previous occasions in European competition, going winless across all four in the group stages of the Champions League (D1 L3).

Bayern are unbeaten in their last 13 matches against Scottish sides in major European competition (W9 D4), with their last such defeat coming against Hearts in the UEFA Cup in February 1989 (0-1).

Celtic have won just one of their 12 Champions League/European Cup clashes with German opposition (D3 L8), although that victory did come in the most recent one, against RB Leipzig in November.

Hoops harbour big dreams

Celtic have won just one of their last 21 games in European competition against teams who have won the European Cup/Champions League, beating Feyenoord 2-1 in December 2023 (D4 L16).

Brendan Rodgers' team were on the end of heavy defeats at Aston Villa (4-2) and Borussia Dortmund (7-1) in the league phase, but generally speaking they beat the teams they were expected to and also held out for an impressive 0-0 draw away at Atalanta.

Their 3-1 defeat of Leipzig showed just what Celtic can offer, and they have some attacking threats Bayern will have to be wary of.

Chief among them is Nicolas Kuhn, who has created 10 chances following a carry (travelling 5+ metres with the ball) in the Champions League this season; the most of any player during the league phase. He has also scored twice.

Adam Idah and Daizen Maeda have shared much of the goalscoring burden, netting three times each in this Champions League campaign.

Bayern should be bullish, but need to be clinical

Bayern scored 20 goals in the league phase, a tally that only Dortmund (22) and Barcelona (28) bettered, while excluding penalties, Kompany's team generated chances worth 19.3 expected goals - the joint-most, along with Atalanta.

No team had as many shots (185) or shots on target (69) than Bayern, though they were let down by their 10.81% conversion rate.

Bayern also struggled away from home. They won just one of their four matches on the road in the league phase. Should Kompany's team lose on Wednesday, it would be the first time the German giants have lost four away matches in single campaign in major European competition.

Kompany has a wealth of stars to call on.

Harry Kane scored six goals in the league phase, while Michael Olise chipped in with four.

Key to success in this match could well be if Bayern get their press right. They have forced the most high turnovers (120) of any team during the league phase of this season’s Champions League, while they turned 21 of those into shots (joint-most).

Meanwhile, only five teams have suffered more high turnovers against them than Celtic (79) in the competition this term.

PLAYERS TO WATCH

Celtic - Arne Engels

Arne Engels has provided a team-leading three assists in the competition, from 15 chances (once again, a team-high).

The versatile full-back is a creative force who could well be on the move again come the summer, given the level of his performances.

Bayern Munich - Joshua Kimmich

Kimmich has been involved in more shot-ending sequences of play (from open play) than any other player in the Champions League this term (72).

He is also the top-ranked player in 2024-25 for both passes completed (689) and line-breaking passes (136).