Champions League final an opportunity for Toni Kroos or Marco Reus to sign off on high 

As another European club season comes to a conclusion, Spanish giants Real Madrid stand at the finish line as one of the two remaining clubs in the Uefa Champions League.

Whereas Madrid are regular finalists in Europe’s elite club competition, the other finalist for the 2023/2024 campaign — Borussia Dortmund — are making just a third appearance in a Champions League decider. Their previous finals produced mixed results.

In the 1997 final, they beat Juventus to be crowned Europe’s best club. Then in 2013, they made their second appearance in a Champions League final. This time they suffered heartbreak as they were vanquished by fellow German club, Bayern Munich.

By contrast, the 1 June final at London’s Wembley Stadium will be Real’s 18th in their glittering and trophy-laden history. They have only lost three finals in that period, with their last defeat in a decider coming all the way back in 1981 — when they were defeated by Bob Paisley’s Liverpool.

All this considered, the balance of power could not be more skewed ahead of what promises to be a riveting affair at Wembley, the site of Dortmund’s last final heartbreak. The line between the favourite and the underdog could not be drawn as bold and clear as it is between Real and Dortmund.

At the beginning of the season, no one could have predicted that the German club would reach this stage. European champions of 2023 Manchester City would have been high up the list as favourites to defend their crown.

Read more in Daily Maverick: Real Madrid dispatch holders Man City in Champions League shootout

Bayern too would’ve been amongst the early favourites for anyone quizzed on the prospective winners of this campaign. The same is true for Kylian Mbappé and his Paris Saint-Germain teammates.

Dortmund, though, read from their own script and shut out the external noise to defy the odds. Now a couple of hours of soccer stands between the club and adding an amazing chapter to their underdog story, plus a second European crown.

German farewell

This Saturday’s final will also be an opportunity for two stars of German soccer, who have enjoyed starkly contrasting careers, to bid farewell to their respective clubs.

Madrid midfield maestro Toni Kroos is set to retire after the upcoming European Championship — which will be hosted by Germany.

This means the final against Dortmund will be his final match for his Spanish club, where he enjoyed unimaginable success, including winning four Champions League titles with Los Blancos.

“One of the greatest, obviously. A very high-quality midfielder, with a fantastic character, with a small ego, very humble and always at the service of the team, very altruistic. What luck to have had him for 10 years,” Madrid manager Carlo Ancelotti said of the star midfielder.

“To do better than Kroos has done, in this team, is very complicated. He has made a very strong decision [to retire], because nobody could have imagined it, but he has shown a lot of character and to say goodbye like that is great,” the Italian added.

Kroos’s compatriot Marco Reus will be departing Dortmund after spending over a decade at his boyhood club, and making over 400 appearances. However, there is a general consensus within the soccer community that Reus never quite reached his full potential, ravaged by injuries for the bulk of his time at Dortmund.

The 34-year-old’s rotten luck with fitness issues saw him miss a number of major tournaments for his home country. Including in 2014, when Germany won their fourth Fifa World Cup. When he did play in the World Cup four years later, Germany were dumped out in the group stage.

“Marco is one of this club’s greatest players,” said CEO Hans-Joachim Watzke on Reus, who signed off by buying all the fans of the club a pint of beer.

“Born in Dortmund, he spent 10 years in our academy, 12 years with the first team. His connection to Borussia Dortmund is extraordinary. We wish Marco all the best for the future from the bottom of our hearts. We also hope he’ll return to Dortmund when he retires, because there’s plenty of exciting roles for him here.”

Ancelotti also has an opportunity to extend his record as the most successful manager in the Champions League. If Los Blancos are successful on Saturday night, the revered Italian will take his tally to five titles and cement his legacy as a great of the game. DM

Real Madrid and Borussia Dortmund kick off at 9 pm South African time on Saturday, 1 June.