Jude Bellingham scored an injury-time winner as Real Madrid defeated Champions League debutants Union Berlin 1-0 at the Santiago Bernabeu on Wednesday.
Carlo Ancelotti’s team has won the competition 14 times, but their stubborn German opponents, who have only been in the Bundesliga for four years, stopped them at every turn until Bellingham scored in the last minute.
The England international has scored six goals in his first six games for Madrid, in all competitions. This is a great start for him.
Madrid looked like they were only going to get a point after Frederik Ronnow, the custodian for Union Berlin, stopped their shots and Rodrygo and Joselu both hit the post before Bellingham stepped in.
“Scoring in the last minute is the spirit of this shirt — of not giving up,” Madrid coach Ancelotti told a news conference.
“(Bellingham) has great qualities, it seems he’s got luck too, because the goal is a rebound, but he was there, he arrives from deep, and he’s more switched on than others, he’s got that quality and he’s taking advantage of it.”
Real Madrid has only failed to score in one of its last 68 home Champions League games, and they have rarely looked as toothless at the Santiago Bernabeu as they did in the first half.
Without injured forward Vinicius Junior, Madrid’s attack has been slow in recent weeks, even though midfielder Bellingham’s goals have given them a perfect record in La Liga after five games.
After moving to Madrid from Borussia Dortmund in the summer, the English midfielder played in the Champions League for the first time.
Bellingham joined Madrid after Manchester City beat them in the semi-finals of the Champions League last season. He is a new star who will help Madrid try to win the competition they want the most.
Even though Madrid has a rich history, the visiting team, led by Swiss coach Urs Fischer, was calm, collected, and most importantly, well-trained on defence.
Making a record Robin Gosens told his Union Berlin teammates that they couldn’t play with “awe and fear,” and they responded by playing well.
Leonardo Bonucci, an experienced Italian defender, was making his first start at the back for the visitors, so maybe it shouldn’t have been a surprise.
The German team sat deep, gave the ball to Madrid, and made it hard for the hosts to play.
In the first half, Joselu missed Madrid’s best chance when he headed just wide, while his teammates could only take random shots from far away.
As time went on in the second half, Madrid got stronger and stronger. Ronnow made a great save to stop Rodrygo at the near post, and then the Brazilian hit the post again with another shot.
Joselu’s headers were blocked by Berlin’s custodian, who also stopped Luka Modric, who was given a rare start by Ancelotti.
In the last few minutes, Union Berlin were hanging on by a thread. With Ronnow already beat, Joselu swung his leg at Bellingham’s cross and sent the ball just a little bit wide.
In the end, Bellingham won the game because he was in the right place at the right time. A Fede Valverde shot hit the post and fell right to him in the box, where he stabbed it in from right in front of the goal.
“I’m disappointed, we were a minute away from taking a point so you can understand that, but on the other hand I’m very proud of my team’s result, they did everything possible,” said Berlin coach Fischer.
“Football is fair — in the 95 minutes Real Madrid clearly ‘won’, but it hurts too if they take your point away in the last minute, because in defence we played well.”
When he joined Madrid, 20-year-old master midfielder Bellingham took Zinedine Zidane’s number five shirt as a tribute to the great Los Blancos player. However, his goals so far have made him Madrid’s de facto replacement for Karim Benzema.
“We have the luck that he’s here playing with us and I hope he keeps scoring a lot of goals,” defender Nacho told Movistar.
“It was a complete game, we had a lot of shots, the one thing we had to do was to be aware of their counter attacks — we’re very happy.”
Photo by EPA/KIKO HUESCA
