On the evening of June 3, the sixty-second Champions League Final was about to ignite at Cardiff Millennium Stadium in Wales!
After a brief pre-match performance, former Welsh striker and ambassador for this Champions League Final Ian Rush carried the Champions League Trophy into Millennium Stadium amid the cheers of the packed stadium, then placed it at the exit of the players' tunnel.
The two teams then slowly emerged under the leadership of German referee Brych.
In an instant, the atmosphere inside the stadium reached a fever pitch, and tens of thousands of fans roared wildly.
Since winning the Champions League in 1996, this was Juventus' fourth appearance in the Champions League Final. Yet their previous three had all ended in defeat, making them the team with the most losses in Champions League Final history.
Real Madrid, meanwhile, had become the most successful team in Champions League history. They had not only reached the Champions League Final more times than anyone else and won it more often than anyone else, but had also achieved a Five-peat, followed later by three consecutive titles. Their most recent run had also been a three-peat, and they were now chasing a fourth straight title.
Everyone seemed to see Real Madrid's dominance over European football. Every opponent—even UEFA—was troubled by it, and all hoped to restrain Real Madrid and prevent a situation in which one team stood alone at the top.
Yet this season, Real Madrid had cut through the Champions League like a hot knife through butter, knocking aside powerhouses such as Naples, Bayern Munich, and Atletico Madrid one after another. They had displayed an unstoppable force.
That gave everyone a headache as well, because no one could defeat Real Madrid openly on the football pitch.
As for the conspiracy theories some media outlets