Real Madrid v Dortmund LIVE: Champions League final score, result and reaction after Vinicius Jr caps win

Even the way they won it went by the familiar script. The same old story, if with a few new elements that Real Madrid can crow about. The club’s 15th Champions League is the first they have won at Wembley.

So, the European Cup finally goes from the home of football to the home of this competition - even though they’ve tried to destroy it with a Super League. That was all thanks to Carlo Ancelotti winning a fifth as a manager and another club stalwart becoming a club legend.

In scoring just the 13th goal of his Real Madrid career after 11 seasons, Dani Carvajal sent the club on the way to a 2-0 victory against a spirited but limited Borussia Dortmund. He adds his name to a legacy that includes Alfredo Di Stefano, Paco Gento, Ferenc Puskas, Predrag Mijatovic, Raul, Zinedine Zidane, Cristiano Ronaldo, Vinicius Jr… and if that by this point reads like the mere relaying of a list, that was almost the point.

Madrid barely had to go through the motions to win. Vinicius Jr even got his customary breakaway goal. Jude Bellingham gets his first Champions League medal to make it a double in his first season, even if this was not his finest game. It didn’t need to be.

It was all so inevitable.

Real Madrid’s No 5 won them the Champions League against German opposition on British soil with a magnificent goal. But at Hampden Park, not Wembley; in 2002, not 2024; when it was Zinedine Zidane, not Jude Bellingham. A stunning volley against Bayer Leverkusen can still feel fresh, but it came the year before Bellingham’s birth.

In one respect, Bellingham is Zidane’s successor. In another, Dani Carvajal is. Real can win Champions League finals with extraordinary goals from remarkable players, as Gareth Bale can testify. Or they can win them with defenders applying the final touch from set-pieces, as Sergio Ramos proved. Or, in the 2020s, they can win them with Vinicius Junior strikes. The common denominator, almost the inevitability, is that Real win them. And so, at 20, Jude Bellingham joins Real’s list of Champions League winners. They are less a band than an army, given the size of them.

The near guarantee of glory is a reason players join Real. Yet Bellingham is not one to accept destiny as much as shape it. Even on what had started to feel like one of his poorest performances for Real, he ended with an assist in the biggest game of his life.

Madrid’s anthem rings around Wembley as Jose Mourinho consoles Edin Terzic and Real’s players run around the pitch celebrating.

For Dortmund fan Terzic, this defeat will hurt doubly, but his attention will soon turn to Dortmund’s domestic future and a need to rebuild an ageing squad.

For Calro Ancelotti, celebrations will continue for now, while behind the scenes Florentino Perez concocts a plan to keep Los Blancos at the top of European football for the foreseeable future.

Carlo Ancelotti collects his seventh Champions League winner’s medal, while Kroos, Nacho and Modric collect their sixth!

15 and counting for Los Blancos as Nacho raises the trophy!

Both sides are lining up for the medal ceremony and trophy lift now. The officials through first before Edin Terzic leads Dortmund through.

Jude Bellingham is the first to speak to TNT Sports, and he’s almost in tears as he talks.

He calls it “the best night of my life”, adding that “I have always dreamed of playing in these games”.

“You go through life and there are so many people who say you cannot do things. I was alright until I was in my mum and dad’s face.

“My little brother is there and I’m trying to be a role model for him. I cannot put it into words.”

Jose Mourinho makes a pertinent point at the end of the game.

Real Madrid don’t sell a philosophy – they put trophies in their trophy cabinet, he says.

“Ask the fans if they care” about how they played in the first half, or during the game against Manchester City, he adds.

Heartbreak in London again for Borussia Dortmund. Once again, they produced a spirited display and had the chances to maybe even win the game, but they fall short at the final hurdle.

Not really a vintage Real Madrid side by any means, but with Endrick and maybe Mbappe still to come, it’ll be hard to stop them in Spain and Europe over the coming years.

FULL-TIME! And that’s it! All over, and Madrid have a 2-0 win and a fifteenth European Cup.

Europe’s greatest club side continue their journey, with the 2023/24 team the latest to be written into the continent’s most illustrious history book.