What seemed to be an impossible task, was almost achieved by the black and white army from Turin. Despite being three goals down after the first leg at Turin against the Los Blancos, Juventus put on a spirited performance at the home of Real Madrid.
The side from Turin not only got the three goals back inside the first 60 minutes of the second leg but also didn’t allow the Los Blancos to score, until the dying moments of the game when a penalty was awarded to Real Madrid after Vasquez was brought down inside the penalty box by Juventus defender Medhi Benatia.
It was Cristiano Ronaldo who put the spot kick in the top right corner away from Szczesny’s reach to take Real through to the semis of the UEFA Champions League for the 8th time in as many years.
What followed that penalty incident was absolute drama. Juve’s captain Gianluigi Buffon was shown a straight red for dissent with the match official Michael Oliver.
It possibly was Buffon’s last shot in winning the elusive Champions League trophy.
It was Mario Mandzukic who scored the first two goals, with the first goal coming in the very first minute of the game. The third goal was scored by Matuidi, after Madrid’s goalkeeper Keylor Navas made an error from a looping Douglas Costa cross.
The absence of Real Madrid captain, Sergio Ramos was quite visible as his replacement for the night, Vallejo was unable to deal with the crosses and cover the empty spaces left by Marcelo.
In a week of madness in the Champions League, where Barcelona gave away a three goal lead against Roma and got knocked out of the tournament, no one saw another upset coming.
Juventus played with a motive and were threatening Madrid’s penalty area way too often. Douglas Costa was exceptional on a night where Juve were without their superstar Argentinian, Paulo Dybala.
An enthralling night of football ended with a controversial red card to one of the game’s best goalkeeper, Gianluigi Buffon.
The match will surely be remembered and talked about for a long time.
With yesterday’s tie coming to an end, the four semi-finalists of the Tournament are from Europe’s elite four league, Bayern Munich from Bundesliga, Liverpool from Premier League, Real Madrid from La Liga and AS Roma from Serie A.
The semifinal draw will take place in the Swiss city, Nyon on Friday.