Mbappé faces Haaland in Champions League appetizer for World Cup. Troubled Liverpool goes to Inter

GENEVA (AP) — A Champions League clash between Kylian Mbappé and Erling Haaland will surely happen in the final one day.

On Wednesday, it is a routine league-phase game when Real Madrid hosts Manchester City and the most feared forwards in soccer cross paths for the third time in the competition since Haaland debuted in 2019.

Also this week, Liverpool brings its season of turmoil — though not Mohamed Salah — to San Siro against Inter Milan on Tuesday, when Bayern Munich hosts Sporting Lisbon. Paris Saint-Germain is at Athletic Bilbao on Wednesday.

In the sixth of the eight rounds, league-leading Arsenal can become the first team to reach the 16-point total that last season ensured advancing direct to the round of 16.

Arsenal is the only team with five straight wins on 15 points and needs to avoid defeat Tuesday at Club Brugge to reach the potential cutoff between eighth and ninth place in January.

Tuesday at Santiago Bernabeu Stadium likely won’t be the last time they meet this season.

France will play Norway on June 26 at the New England Patriots’ stadium in Foxborough, Mass., in one of the most anticipated games from the World Cup draw made Friday.

There might also be more in the Champions League given that Real Madrid and Manchester City met in the knockout rounds in each of the past four seasons. They combined to win three titles in that time though Mbappé still seeks his first.

Mbappé vs. Haaland first happened in the round of 16 in February 2020. Newly arrived at Borussia Dortmund, Haaland scored two in the first leg against Paris Saint-Germain and revealed his “Zen” goal celebration, sitting down cross-legged as if meditating. Mbappé and PSG won in Paris to advance 3-2 on aggregate score.

Last season, in the knockout playoffs in February, Mbappé scored four times including a hat trick in the second leg as Madrid beat Man City in both games, despite Haaland’s two goals in the first leg.

Mbappé’s four goals at Olympiakos last month lifted him to be top scorer in the Champions League this season. He needs one more to reach 10 in a Champions League season for the first time during his decade in the competition.

Haaland has five so far, and already got into double figures in three Champions League campaigns.

Madrid starts the week in fifth place on 12 points, two ahead of City in ninth in the 36-team standings.

Harry Kane is just as prolific for Bayern Munich this season. He has scored 28 in just 22 games for Bayern plus five in five World Cup qualifiers for England.

Kane has kept pace with Haaland’s goal-a-game ratio in the Champions League and kept Bayern third in the standings, despite losing at Arsenal two weeks ago.

Ahead of Kane and Haaland is six-goal Victor Osimhen, who is fit to return with Galatasaray at Monaco on Tuesday. Both teams are in contention for a top-24 finish and places in the knockout stage starting in February.

Barcelona hosting Eintracht Frankfurt is a repeat of a remarkable show of force by visiting fans four seasons ago — and one the Spanish club has now worked to avoid.

Eintracht’s road to winning the Europa League in 2022 included what looked and sounded like a home game to win 3-2 at Camp Nou in the second leg of the quarterfinals.

About 30,000 German fans were there after most bought tickets from Barcelona fans, who last week were warned by their club not to do that again.

“If the traceability of ticket purchases and their final destination reveals fraudulent behavior, the case will be referred to the disciplinary committee,” Barcelona said last week in a statement.

Barcelona is certainly favored to win this time. The La Liga leader scored five in winning at the weekend while Eintracht was routed 6-0 at Leipzig.

It will be an unusually early Champions League kickoff at 4:30 p.m. Central Europe Time when Kairat Almaty hosts Olympiakos on Tuesday. That is 8:30 p.m. in eastern Kazakhstan where evening temperatures can plummet in December.

UEFA planned well to schedule the game Tuesday instead of Wednesday. Forecast temperature at kickoff is about 0 Celsius (32 Fahrenheit) while it should be -12 C (10 F) at the same time one day later.

Bodo/Glimt’s European season continues at Borussia Dortmund on Wednesday after its domestic season finished in Norway being edged for the title by Viking. The Norwegian league avoids the bitter winter and Glimt has two more Champions League games in January, and maybe more in the knockout phase, during the Norwegian offseason.

AP soccer: https://apnews.com/hub/soccer

Inter Milan's Carlos Augusto celebrates with his teammates after scoring his side's fourth goal during a Serie A soccer match between Inter and Como, in Milan, Italy, Saturday, Dec. 6, 2025. (AP Photo/Luca Bruno)

Liverpool's manager Arne Slot waves to fans after the English Premier League soccer match between West Ham United and Liverpool, in London, Sunday, Nov. 30, 2025. (AP Photo/Kirsty Wigglesworth)

FILE - Frankfurt's Martin Hinteregger applauds fans after winning the Europa League, second leg, quarterfinal soccer match against Barcelona at the Camp Nou stadium, in Barcelona, Spain, Thursday, April 14, 2022. (AP Photo/Joan Monfort, file)

Manchester City's Erling Haaland during the English Premier League soccer match between Manchester City and Sunderland in Manchester, England, Saturday, Dec. 6, 2025. (AP Photo/Dave Thompson)

Real Madrid's Kylian Mbappe poses with the trophy after scoring four goal during the Champions League opening phase soccer match between Olympiacos and Real Madrid, in in Piraeus port, near Athens, Greece, Wednesday, Nov. 26, 2025. (AP Photo/Petros Giannakouris)

ST. MATTHEWS, S.C. (AP) — The former court clerk in South Carolina who helped out with the murder trial of attorney Alex Murdaugh pleaded guilty Monday to criminal charges for showing sealed court exhibits to a photographer and lying about it in court.

Former Colleton County Clerk of Court Mary Rebecca “Becky” Hill pleaded guilty in Colleton County Circuit Court to four charges — obstruction of justice and perjury for showing a reporter photographs that were sealed court exhibits and then lying about it — as well as two counts of misconduct in office for taking bonuses and promoting through her public office a book she wrote on the trial.

Judge Heath Taylor sentenced Hill to a year of probation. The judge told Hill her sentence would have been much harsher if prosecutors had found that she had tampered with the Murdaugh jury.

Hill read a short statement where she asked the judge for a chance to do better.

"There is no excuse for the mistakes I made. I’m ashamed of them and will carry that shame the rest of my life,” she said.

Hill was in charge of taking care of the jury, overseeing exhibits and helping the judge during Murdaugh's six-week trial that ended with murder convictions for killing his wife and son. The case involved power, danger, money and privilege and an attorney whose family had lorded over his small South Carolina county for nearly a century.

Hill has played a prominent part as Murdaugh appeals his convictions and a sentence of life without parole. His lawyers said Hill tried to influence jurors to vote guilty and that she was biased against Murdaugh for her book.

Prosecutors said they investigated jury tampering allegations. But while three jurors or alternates said Hill told stories that changed about how she may have tried to influence them, 11 said she did nothing wrong.

“I would be facing a trial with 11 witnesses coming in to say everything the state is saying is not true,” Solicitor Rick Hubbard said.

During Monday's hearing, Hubbard told the judge that a journalist told investigators that Hill showed graphic crime scene photos to several media members. He did not name the journalist.

The photos were posted online and Hubbard said metadata from the images matched up with a time where Hill's courthouse key card said she was inside the locked room where the photos were kept.

Murdaugh is also serving a separate sentence of decades in prison for admitting to stealing millions of dollars from settlements for clients who suffered horrible injuries or deaths — and from his family’s law firm.

An initial appeal by Murdaugh’s lawyers was denied. But Judge Jean Toal said she wasn’t sure Hill told the truth about her dealings with jurors and was “attracted by the siren call of celebrity” status.

Along with showing the sealed exhibits, an arrest warrant said Hill lied to Toal during a January 2024 hearing when the judge asked: “Did you allow anyone from the press to view the sealed exhibits?”

One of the charges — misconduct in office — involved money that investigators said Hill took for herself. She brought a check to court on Monday to pay back nearly $10,000 meant for bonuses from federal money meant to improve child support collection and about $2,000 in money from the Clerk of Court’s office.

The warrant on the other misconduct charge said Hill used her public role as clerk of court to promote her book on the Murdaugh trial on social media.

The judge said he knows Hill has been more humiliated than most people who come before him because of all the attention from the true crime world on the Murdaugh case.

“ A lot of boats got swept up in the hoopla that was at that trial,” Taylor said. “A lot of folks probably made a lot of money, but you didn’t.”

Hill was also accused last May of 76 counts of ethics violations. Officials said Hill allowed a photo of Murdaugh in a holding cell to be taken to promote her book on the trial and used county money to buy dozens of lunches for her staff, prosecutors and a vendor.

Hill also struck a deal with a documentary maker to use the county courtroom in exchange for promoting her book on the trial, which later she admitted had plagiarized passages, according to the South Carolina Ethics Commission complaint.

Hill resigned in March 2024 during the last year of her four-year term, citing the public scrutiny of Murdaugh’s trial and wanting to spend time with her grandchildren.

FILE- Colleton County Clerk of Court Rebecca Hill is sworn in before taking the stand to testify during the Alex Murdaugh jury-tampering hearing at the Richland County Judicial Center, Monday, Jan. 29, 2024, in Columbia, S.C. Hill, under investigation amid allegations of tampering with the jury in the Alex Murdaugh trial, announced her resignation on Monday, March 25, 2024. (Andrew J. Whitaker/The Post And Courier via AP, Pool, File)

Former Colleton County Clerk of Court Mary Rebecca "Becky" Hill awaits a court hearing on Monday, Dec. 8, 2025, in St. Matthews, S.C. (AP Photo/Jeffrey Collins)

Former Colleton County Clerk of Court Mary Rebecca "Becky" Hill awaits a court hearing on Monday, Dec. 8, 2025, in St. Matthews, S.C. (AP Photo/Jeffrey Collins)