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How Inter got here. They finished the league phase in fourth spot, before seeing off Feyenoord, Bayern Munich and – quite sensationally – Barcelona. Fancy reliving that glorious nonsense again? Of course you do.
League stage (fourth out of 36)
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Red Star Belgrade (h) 4-0
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Young Boys (a) 1-0
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RB Leipzig (h) 1-0
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Bayer Leverkusen (a) 1-0
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Slavia Prague (a) 1-0
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Monaco (h) 3-0
Round of 16
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Feyenoord (a) 2-0
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Feyenoord (h) 2-1
Quarter-final
Semi-final
How PSG got here. Trouncing everyone from the Premier League, basically. They only scraped through the league phase in 15th place, thanks in no small part to a remarkable comeback against Manchester City. Then in the knockouts, Liverpool, Aston Villa and Arsenal were dispatched with varying degrees of drama. Which one’s supposed to be the Farmers League again?
League stage (15th out of 36)
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Girona (h) 1-0
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PSV Eindhoven (h) 1-1
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Atletico Madrid (h) 1-2
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Bayern Munich (a) 0-1
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Red Bull Salzburg (a) 3-0
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VfB Stuttgart (a) 4-1
Play-offs
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Brest (a) 3-0
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Brest (h) 7-0
Round of 16
Quarter-final
Semi-final
Inter are the last Italian club to win this trophy. You can relive their 2010 win below (and there’s a special treat within for modern-day fans of PGMOL). This is the Nerazzurri’s seventh European Cup final; their hit-rate so far is 50-50, so no clues.
1963-64: Inter 3-1 Real Madrid
1964-65: Inter 1-0 Benfica
1966-67: Celtic 2-1 Inter
1971-72: Ajax 2-0 Inter
2009-10: Inter 2-0 Bayern Munich
2022-23: Manchester City 1-0 Inter
This is PSG’s second European Cup final. They’re one of five French clubs to make it this far, along with Reims (1956, 1959), St-Étienne (1976), Marseille (1991, 1993) and Monaco (2004). They’ve already got one European title to their name: the 1995-96 Cup Winners’ Cup.
2019-20: Bayern Munich 1-0 PSG
This will be the fifth European Cup final to be played in Munich, and the historical precedents strongly favour PSG tonight. Every final in Munich has produced a first-time winner. One of those was the only previous occasion clubs from France and Italy have met in a final … and that game was the only time a team from France has won the trophy. If Inter are to win tonight, they’ll need to do some serious trend-bucking here.
1978-79: Nottingham Forest 1-0 Malmö
1992-93: Marseille 1-0 AC Milan
1996-97: Borussia Dortmund 3-1 Juventus
2011-12: Chelsea 1-1 Bayern Munich (aet; 4-3 pens)
Preamble
The two clubs contesting the 70th European Cup / Champions League final are cut from very different types of cloth. Internazionale are European royalty, the defensive masters of the mid-Sixties under Helenio Herrera, the similarly staunch usurpers of 2010 under Jose Mourinho, six-time finalists across the ages. Herrera’s team were known as La Grande Inter, which gives us some idea of status. Paris Saint-Germain are parvenus by comparison: the club were minus six years old when La Grande Inter were winning their first European Cup. Just the one unsuccessful appearance in the final for PSG, whose main mark on the competition to date has been historic collapses in earlier rounds. But times change, and they’re the favourites today.
The teams themselves are a study in contrast too. PSG are a gang of thrusting young bucks: Désiré Doué and Warren Zaïre-Emery are 19, João Neves 20, Bradley Barcola 22, Willian Pacho 23, Khvicha Kvaratskhelia 24. Inter’s average age is 31, with 37-year-old Francesco Acerbi at the back and Henrikh Mkhitaryan in midfield a sprightly 36. PSG were crowned French champions nearly two months ago and have been able to grab some R&R since then; Inter are smarting from their failure to win Serie A just last week. Yep, PSG are the favourites today all right.
But then look what Inter did to hotly-tipped Barcelona in the semis, and tonight’s final in Munich is very much up for grabs. Will Inter win their fourth title? Or will PSG finally get their name on the biggest prize of all, ascending to become European royalty at long last? Kick-off is at 9pm in Munich, 8pm BST. It’s on!
