- Minute by minute. Dortmund vs Real Madrid
- UCL. Every Champions League winner
Real Madrid prove inevitable as Los Blancos win 15th Champions League against a plucky Borussia Dortmund side who dominated the game for long stretches, but Dani Carvajal and Vinicius Jr. scored twice to give Los Blancos a 2-0 win.
It may have been the start many expected, but Real Madrid immediately appeared to settle into the showpiece event.
The Spanish champions controlled possession early and it looked as though Eduardo Camavinga was going to dictate proceedings from midfield in a way that could draw comparisons to his teammate, Toni Kroos.
Camavinga moved the ball expertly out of midfield and into attacking positions, picking out Jude Bellingham on a number of occasions, however Los Blancos were let down by poor decision making in the final third.
First it was Federico Valverde who ignored a simple pass to Bellingham in space, instead electing to fire a shot way above the crossbar and into the Wembley crowd.
Then Vinicius Jr. did something similar when he cut inside from the right flank, letting Dortmund's defense off the hook with a poor shot into the stands.
Whilst Real Madrid appeared in control, there is a great equalizer in football, rather like knockout power in heavyweight boxing, and it is pace.
Karim Adeyemi is seen as one of the quickest players to ever play in the Champions League and he immediately put Real Madrid's defense on notice when a fortuitous pass set him through on Thibaut Courtois' goal.
The Belgian stopper, clearly still not 100 percent after his ACL injury, couldn't come off his line quickly enough to cut the danger out and Adeyemi attempted to take the ball round him, yet his touch was too heavy and his shot was cleared off the line.
Adeyemi's speed had clearly troubled the Real Madrid defense and their gameplan changed. All of a sudden, the Spanish side were more reserved, almost worried about being caught on the counter.
Borussia Dortmund had their best chance just minutes after when Niclas Fullkrug was played through, but his toe-poked shot rolled into the left post of Real Madrid's goal and bounced clear.
Courtois was called into action just before the break, making a diving save low to his right following a rasping Marcel Sabitzer shot from just outside the area.
Real Madrid were willing to suffer for large periods
The second-half began with Real Madrid clearly looking to rectify their sloppiness at the end of the previous half.
Toni Kroos forced a diving save out of Gregor Kobel with a well-struck free-kick 25 yards out whilst Dani Carvajal narrowly missed the goal with a header from the resulting corner.
Yet, Real Madrid then took their foot off the gas, allowing Dortmund to have a lot of the ball, and Fullkrug was again involved on the hour when his powerful diving header was swatted away by Courtois.
For all their quality, Real Madrid lacked a central presence in attack. Bellingham ran out of steam trying to be a box-to-box threat on every possession and around the 70-minute mark even he looked to be desperate for Joselu to be introduced.
Alas, this Real Madrid team just knows how to win Champions League matches. They were willing to suffer for a sizable period of the second-half, and then spring into action out of nothing.
Camavinga started a move with a great pass into Vinicius Jr. who was able to electrify the crowd with a clever nutmeg, yet Dortmund's defense was able to seemingly clear the danger.
It fell to the edge of the box when a speculative shot clipped Ian Maatsen's outstretched leg to force an unnecessary corner.
This time Carvajal was able to get his header on target in what was a carbon-copy of his earlier chance. The ball flew into the far corner of the net to put Real Madrid 1-0 up with 17 minutes to go.
Borussia Dortmund were rocked, just as Bayern Munich were in the semi-final, and Bellingham spurned a chance to kill the final with a little over 10 minutes to play.
The English midfielder received the ball in space in the penalty area, waited for Kobel to come out, and his shot was placed just wide of the post, although Schlotterbeck appeared to have got a vital touch on the ball with a last-ditch challenge.
Dortmund introduced forwards aplenty in the hope of scoring an equalizer, however the damage was done. The Real Madrid way had left the German's stunned and Maatsen made a catastrophic error to decide the game.
The on-loan Chelsea defender played a blind pass across his own defense, which went straight to Bellingham who found Vinicius Jr. inside the box and he delicately chipped the ball over Kobel and into the net to make it 2-0 and secure Los Merengues' 15th Champions League.