68 2GM Wednesday April 13 2022 | the times
SportChampions League quarter-final, second leg
With their first goal, in the 15th minute,
this looked like a plucky act of Chelsea
resistance. It wasn’t. It wasn’t just a
plucky act at all. It was one of the great-
est of all exhibitions of defiance.
In the end it didn’t quite secure Chel-
sea a place in the Champions League
semi-finals. Yet it was a magnificent
victory of its own kind; even without
winning, Chelsea pulled off something
that looked beyond them; even inForget the cruel defeat,
this was still a Chelsea
triumph over adversity
defeat, it was a triumph over adversity.
If there was a point for Chelsea when
this extraordinary season of unprece-
dented turmoil was really going to
punish them, it would have been last
night at the Santiago Bernabéu —
which, yes, was a reasonable thought
shortly before kick-off.
In the 15th minute, though, Mateo
Kovacic fed Timo Werner, who
released Mason Mount. Mount was
free, he picked his spot in the right cor-
ner and Thibaut Courtois could not
prevent him from finding it.
Thomas Tuchel, the head coach, had
warned that Chelsea needed “a fantas-
tic script” — and this is what they gave
him. Mount in space was just a key
opening line. For the course of this
game Chelsea made it an entire book.
They never looked, here, like under-Exhibition of defiance
was remarkable after
weeks of unprecedented
turmoil off the pitch,
writes Owen Slot
Real Madrid (4-3-3): T Courtois 6 — D Carvajal 6,
Nacho 5 (L Vázquez 88, 6), D Alaba 6, F Mendy 5
(Marcelo 78, 7) — L Modric 7, Casemiro 6
(Rodrygo 78, 8), T Kroos 6 (E Camavinga 73, 7) —
F Valverde 6, K Benzema 7, Vinícius 7 (D Ceballos
115). Booked Benzema, Valverde, Carvajal.
Chelsea (3-4-1-2): É Mendy 6 — R James 7, T Silva
7, A Rüdiger 8 — R Loftus-Cheek 7 (Saúl 106), N
Kanté 7 (H Ziyech 99), M Kovacic 7 (Jorginho
106), M Alonso 7 — M Mount 8 — K Havertz 7,
T Werner 7 (C Pulisic 83, 6). Booked James,
Ziyech, Havertz, Azpilicueta.
Referee S Marciniak (Pol).Tuchel turns away after
another missed chance
At the final whistle of one of the most
memorable Chelsea performances yet
frustrating outcomes, the outstanding
Reece James fell to the Bernabéu grass,
having given absolutely everything for
two hours. Although he got no reward
for his prodigious efforts, James left
with the respect of Karim Benzema,
who walked across and handed the
Chelsea right back his shirt.
James embodied Chelsea’s spirit. He
was booked after ten minutes, following
Vinícius Júnior’s wearyingly inevitable
tumble on being slightly pulled back,
yet the 22-year-old didn’t hide. He rose
to the challenge, putting in more chal-
lenges, even contributing to the attack,
and was exhausted by his exertions.
All around were scenes of Chelsea
devastation. Antonio Rüdiger lay flat
out. The centre back played so well,
keeping Benzema at bay for 96 minutes,
but then slipped at the crucial moment
allowing Real’s captain the chance to
decide an astonishing tie. Marcos Alon-
so, who thought he had won the game
until VAR intervened for a handball,
just stared at the floor. Thiago Silva
stood there, unmoving, until awoken
from his distracted state by Luka
Modric, who embraced him.
Real players also sought out Mateo
Kovacic, who looked around at a ground
at which he spent four seasons, and this
was arguably his finest performance
here. It was brutal that the Chelsea mid-
field dynamo should go out of the
Champions League having played as
intelligently and defiantly as this.
All the time, Mason Mount was going
round, consoling his stricken team-
mates. Mount eventually led the
players to the corner, and saluted the
Chelsea fans. Mount then glanced at
the jubilant Real fans, who had seemed
too complacent earlier in the evening,
expecting a regal procession to the
semi-final having done the hard graft
with a 3-1 win at the Bridge, in which
Benzema was the destroyer of Chelsea
dreams again, with a hat-trick.
Mount then left the field, and it was
unimaginably cruel that he should fin-
ish the night among the vanquished. He
had been the one to allow Chelsea to
dream. Whatever the odds, Mount
calmly, determinedly set to work.
Whatever the warnings from history
that only three English teams had ever
before won in the Bernabéu in the
Champions League, Arsenal (2006),
Liverpool (2009) and Manchester
City (2020), but none had done
it by a two-goal margin,
Mount always had this belief,
in himself, in his
team-mates, and in the
Chelsea cause.
Playing just off the
hard-working, wide-
roaming front pair of
Kai Havertz and Timo
Werner, Mount was
immediately involved,
moving between the
lines and scoring within
15 minutes, to give Chel-
sea real hope. Mount
appeared on the left
high up the field, and
played the ball back to Kovacic. Chelsea
accelerated. Kovacic slid his pass 20
yards into Ruben Loftus-Cheek,
who helped the ball on and it fell
via Werner neatly into the path
of Mount. The England inter-
national had continued his
run in from the left, getting
in ahead of Nacho, bring-
ing his right foot down
and side-footing the
ball at pace past Thib-
aut Courtois. It was a
beautiful, placed fin-
ish, meaning every-
thing to the Chelsea fans,
particularly as it was past
Courtois, who had caused such
anger with the inelegant way in
which he left the club for Real.
Mount did not pause to ad-
mire the view of Courtois pick-
ing the ball out of the net. He was
racing back to his half, eschewingReal Madrid
Rodrygo 80, Benzema 96Chelsea
Mount 15, Rüdiger 51, Werner 752
3
Lethal Benzema strikes again
any celebration, knowing there was still
plenty of work to do, that Real still held
the advantage. Others in Chelsea
yellow shouted words of congratula-
tions as they rushed back. As Mount
ran past Werner, he tapped the German
on the head for the unlikely assist.
Yet the oft-derided Werner played
his part in dragging Real’s defence
around in what was a troubled half for
Carlo Ancelotti’s side. Like Havertz,
Werner would pull wide, distracting
Nacho and David Alaba, opening space
for Chelsea to attack. Thomas Tuchel
unleashed as much pace as possible.
James, knowing one mistake would
bring expulsion, refused to retreat into
any form of fear, and stood up to the
runs of Vinícius. He even advanced
upfield to win a corner off Modric six
minutes into the second half. Mount
swung the dead-ball across, Rüdiger
simply wanted it most, rising and
powering the sweetest of headers past
Courtois. “We know what we are,
champions of Europe, we know what
we are,” chorused the Chelsea fans.
Real had to wake up, although Chel-
sea deserved huge credit for the way
they cut the supply line to Benzema for
so long. Sensing the danger, Real’s fans
began to make more noise. All the thou-
sands who had lined the elegant local
streets beforehand, greeting the Real
team bus with twirling scarves and
smoking flares, realised they were in a
dogfight. Out on the field, really only
Benzema led the fight and steered one
header on to Édouard Mendy’s bar.
Chelsea stayed calm, went down the
other end and, unbelievably, gloriously,
took the lead. Kovacic, having one of
the games of his life, released Werner,
who left Casemiro staring at the turf,
eluded David Alaba, and as Dani Car-
vajal dived in, he finished past Courtois.
Advantage Chelsea.
Real were staring at humiliation. The
fans rallied. The players responded.
Carlo Ancelotti sent on Marcelo and
Rodrygo, who made an immediate
impact. Marcelo intercepted an N’Golo
Kanté pass, Modric lifted a beautiful
50-yard pass into the path of Rodrygo,
whose driven finish gave Mendy no
chance. Level on aggregate.
Chelsea still had chances to win it in
normal time through Christian Pulisic,
on as a substitute. But six minutes into
the first additional period, Benzema
finally found a yard of space to inflict
damage on Chelsea. It still needed that
desperately unfortunate slip from
Rüdiger to allow a Vinícius cross to
carry through to Benzema, who headed
down past Mendy.
Tuchel had to act, his team were tir-
ing, and for a manager who has under-
standably been campaigning for five
substitutes in the Premier League, he
took time to use his complement here,
and used only four. Hakim Ziyech came
on and was denied by Courtois. Pulisic
went close with a header. Chelsea kept
creating chances, and Havertz should
have taken his.
Real are too experienced to let an ag-
gregate lead like this slip and they saw
it out. As Mount and James left the field,
Chelsea fans chanted, “Champions of
Europe — we’ll sing it ‘til May”. Chelsea
went out, but James, Mount and
company went out with pride.Henry Winter
Chief Football
Writer, Madrid
The Ricketts family have added
Lord Bilimoria, the founder of
Cobra Beer, to their consortium in
an attempt to strengthen their bid
to buy Chelsea.
The family, who own baseball’s
Chicago Cubs franchise, are
leading one of the four bids to buy
Chelsea from Roman Abramovich
but have faced resistance after it
emerged that Joe Ricketts, 80, the
patriarch of the family, made
Islamophobic comments in emails
that surfaced in 2019.
Bilimoria, who will join the
club’s board of directors if the
Ricketts family are successful, said:
“I founded Cobra Beer down the
road from Stamford Bridge and
have been a season ticket holder
for many years,” he said. “So when
Tom Ricketts approached me,
there was no way I could refuse.”
The three other consortiums are
led by the LA Dodgers baseball co-
owner Todd Boehly, the former
British Airways chairman Sir
Martin Broughton, and the Boston
Celtics basketball co-owner
Stephen Pagliuca, who suggested
yesterday that he would be
prepared to reduce or relinquish his
stake in the Italian side Atalanta.Cobra Beer
founder joins
bid for club
Tom RoddyAet; Real win 5-4 on aggregate
Villarreal knock out Bayern
Villarreal knocked Bayern Munich
out of the Champions League
thanks to Samuel Chukwueze’s
88th-minute strike at the Allianz
Arena. The game ended 1-1, with the
Spanish team winning the tie 2-1 on
aggregate. If Liverpool get through
tonight against Benfica, they will
play Villarreal in the semis.