The UEFA Champions League final is set to be played at Wembley Stadium, London, England, on June 1st. The two incredible teams, who are set to be playing, are the German club, Borussia Dortmund, and the Spanish club, Real Madrid.
These teams have fought incredibly hard to make it all the way to the final. Borussia Dortmund, who were expected to be grouped out of the group stages, topped the group, beat PSV in the round of 16, beat Atletico Madrid in the quarter-finals, and beat PSG, who were expected to reach the finals. This is definitely one of the best runs in the Champions League. From expecting to get grouped to reaching the finals is an incredible achievement. Real Madrid, likewise, have made an incredible run but also some controversial decisions went in their favor. One major example to support that claim was the refereeing decision against Bayern Munich in the 2nd leg of the semi finals. In the 13th minute of added time, Bayern scored, but they were baffled with the offside flag and the referee blew the whistle; therefore, Bayern lost 2-1 and were eliminated. Regardless, they have had good games as well including the game vs Manchester city in the quarter finals, where they drew at home in the first leg and drew again in the second leg. However, the performances of the goalkeeper and the penalty shootouts had paved their way to qualify for the semi finals.
Finals prediction
This final will be very interesting as it will be the last games for some of the superstars of both clubs. Real Madrid legend Toni Kroos will retire from club football at the end of the season, and Dortmund player, Marco Reus, will be retiring from the club as well. So, the team that is set to win on paper is Real Madrid because they have won 14 champions leagues and have made many comebacks to get there. However, this is not always the case. There have been many finals in which the underdog teams have prospered. For example, Chelsea, who had finished 6th place in their domestic league, beat the almighty Bayern Munich in the finals in 2012. In addition, in the Europa League final this year, the German team, Bayer Leverkusen, who had finished unbeaten in the Bundesliga, had lost to the Italian team, Atalanta, who finished 6th in the Serie A.
This proves that it does not matter how much you have dominated in your respective league, but how you perform on the pitch that day. Even though this may be the case, I still believe that Real Madrid will win it, but not without a fight. I think Dortmund will definitely give them a hard time, and they will struggle, but they will manage to break the defense and at least score a few goals. Overall, I think that this final will be incredible to watch, and we have to just wait to find out.
Post-Match Thoughts
At the end of the day, I did stand correct by predicting that Real Madrid would clutch their 15th Champions League Title, and Dortmund would give them a fight. In the first half, it did not look like Real Madrid wanted to win. There were many shots on target produced by Dortmund player, Karim Adeyemi, but all of them were soon going to be a worthless effort. In the second half, Real Madrid had broken their formation and eventually Real Madrid Player, Dani Carvajal, despite being 5’2”, scored a brilliant header to give them the lead. Just when Borussia Dortmund thought that they still had a chance to equalize the score, nine minutes later, Real Madrid and Brazilian star boy, Vinicius Junior, had scored a goal to seal it and celebrated with a funny dance. All in all, Real Madrid have shown that they are the kings of Europe, and they never should be underestimated!
THE NORTH STAR 