“In this cup and in this place anything can happen,” Vinícius Júnior said, barely audible in the midst of the madness after yet another night in which it had. Real Madrid gonna Real Madrid. One hundred and 43 days after they met at Wembley, the Champions League finalists faced each other again and Borussia Dortmund scored twice in four minutes midway through the first half, the quickest team to come here and take a two-goal lead in almost 20 years, so Real Madrid went and scored five even faster. “We went in at half-time shitting ourselves but we listened, we said get one, we’ll come back again,” the Brazilian revealed, and so it was.
Madrid had gone into the dressing room 2-0 down, goals from Donyell Malen and the Reading-born Jamie Bynoe-Gittens giving Dortmund a lead they deserved. A banner before the game announced that this was Madrid’s crown and Madrid’s cup, which it always was and always will be, but at that stage it you wondered if it might just be Dortmund’s night. History, though, has warned otherwise so many times, the ridiculous now routine, and here it was repeated. Madrid win, which is what they do, and ultimately they had deserved it too; their superb second half yielding five goals and underlining their candidacy for the trophy they like to think of as their own.
Madrid went from 2-0 down to 2-2 in 103 seconds, the goals scored by Antonio Rüdiger and Vinícius. Then Lucas Vázquez put them into the lead with seven minutes left, and less than one minute after Thibaut Courtois had saved them from trailing again. Finally Vinícius produced two more, the first a belting finish, to complete a hat-trick and another comeback for the club that can’t get enough of them. Delirium took hold, chants of “this is how Madrid win!” Only one team has ever won a Champions League game by three goals having trailed by two before – and that was them too.
This was some night; in the end it was all thunder, but the touch that started it all off was glorious, so soft, so subtle, it was as if Serhou Guirassy had worn carpet slippers to Santiago Bernabéu. An €18m summer signing from Stuttgart, the Dortmund striker received a loose ball in the area and didn’t so much kick it as sweep it, on the turn, across the turf and between Rüdiger and Ferland Mendy to Malen who, alone in front of Courtois, opened the scoring.
The goal they couldn’t score in London, Dortmund got in Madrid, and soon they had a second, the lead doubled on 36 minutes. No one had come here and led by two so early for 18 years. Again, the goal was superbly done, Julian Brandt finding Malen on the right, who surged past Mendy and pulled across the six-yard box. Heading in on a diagonal dash from the right, that Vázquez didn’t see until it was too late, was Gittens to finish.
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At 20 years and 75 days, Gittens had just become the youngest Englishman ever to score against Madrid. The look spoke to what this moment meant and, pointing, he thanked Malen for giving it to him. Then he blew off the smoke from his finger pistols. Éder Militão clenched his fists, covered his face and beat the turf, unable to believe this. From the Bernabéu came whistles which did at least wake them up.
As if they had needed jeopardy to get going, Madrid immediately created chances. Vinícius’s long speared pass found Jude Bellingham alone but his header went straight at Gregor Kobel. Next Rodrygo controlled on his chest and volleyed against the crossbar, the ball dropping to Bellingham who smashed it back again, the ball bouncing down on to the line and out. Where, almost as quickly, Brandt almost scored a bizarre own goal, only to be rescued by Kobel. Dortmund had survived three near misses in as many seconds. If that would have been game on, it was almost game over the very next minute, Courtois flying to save Brandt’s shot.
Madrid departed to whistles at half-time and reappeared to them too but they would be replaced by roars, that we’re after you now noise the Bernabéu does, soundtrack to countless comebacks. Listless before, there was life now: aggression, pace, intent. Kobel saved from Vázquez and then from Vinícius, the storm starting to stir. And although Malen was denied by Courtois, Dortmund took refuge deeper into their area, Nuri Sahin’s decision to replace Gittens with the defender Waldemar Anton only inviting the siege. Rüdiger crashed through their defences and thudded in a header from Kylian Mbappé’s cross on 59 minutes, that feeling returning.
Oh they’re coming, all right. Less than two minutes later, they arrived. Mbappé’s run and tumble led to Vinícius rolling into an open net. The flag was up, the eruption held and then, via VAR, released again, even louder. They had been playing less than 20 minutes of the second half and Madrid had racked up 10 shots already and weren’t about to stop; Dortmund, overwhelmed, only wished they would.
In truth, it did seem that Dortmund might have weathered the worst of the storm; in fact, they could actually have won this. Which, when you face Real Madrid, tends to be the moment in which you lose it. With eight minutes left, they ventured out, Maximilian Beier, Brandt and Emre Can leading them up the field to where Beier’s shot from six yards was saved by Courtois. Forty-six seconds later, Vázquez was at the other end, hammering beyond Kobel, the finish as good as Rodrygo’s run to keep the move alive. Dortmund were done; Madrid were not. Madrid never are.
