Legia Warsaw 3-3 Real Madrid in the Champions League

Legia Warsaw and Real Madrid played out a sensational draw (3-3) in the second group-stage meeting between the two teams. The Spaniards dominated completely and took a 2-0 lead in the first half. Gareth Bale opened the scoring with a magnificent volley from outside the box, and Karim Benzema doubled the lead in the 35th minute. Los Blancos also missed plenty of chances, including one cleared off the goal line. The hosts, however, managed to pull a goal back just before half-time through Vadis Odjidja-Ofoe.

The miracle was completed in the second half, when the experienced midfielder Miroslav Radovic equalised in the 58th minute. It was his second goal against Los Blancos, as Radovic had also found the net in the first game between the two teams. The match looked set to finish 2-2, but the home side made the most of a great attack and Thibault Moulin gave Legia the lead for the first time with just seven minutes to go.

Real Madrid then attacked even more aggressively. Just two minutes after conceding the third goal, Zinedine Zidane’s players equalised through a good shot from Mateo Kovacic to make it 3-3. In the final minutes Lucas Vazquez could even have won the match for Real Madrid, but the Spaniard saw his shot hit the bar.

Los Blancos were on a run of 27 consecutive games without defeat in all competitions, but after this draw they dropped to second place in Group F, as Borussia Dortmund won their match against Sporting Lisbon. The Polish side earned their first point in that season’s edition of the most prestigious European club tournament. With that point, Legia could even dream of third place in the group, but they would have to beat Sporting Lisbon in the last match of the group stage.

An empty stadium in Warsaw

The draw was all the more unusual because nobody was in the stands to see it. The match on 2 November 2016 was played behind closed doors as a punishment imposed by UEFA, so the official attendance was recorded as zero. The comeback, from 2-0 down to 3-2 up, took place in front of empty seats.

The result also stood out against the rest of Legia’s group. The Polish champions had opened the campaign with a 6-0 home defeat by Borussia Dortmund on 14 September 2016, lost 2-0 away at Sporting and were beaten 5-1 by Real Madrid at the Santiago Bernabéu on 18 October, when Miroslav Radović scored their only goal from the penalty spot. The 3-3 in Warsaw was the first sign that the team could compete at that level.

How Group F ended

Legia’s next match produced a record of a different kind. On 22 November 2016 Borussia Dortmund beat them 8-4 at Signal Iduna Park. The twelve goals made it the highest-scoring game in Champions League history, beating the 8-3 between Monaco and Deportivo La Coruña from the 2003-04 season. Shinji Kagawa and Marco Reus each scored twice for Dortmund, and Aleksandar Prijović scored two of Legia’s four.

On the final matchday, 7 December 2016, Legia did what they needed to do. A first-half goal from Guilherme gave them a 1-0 home win over Sporting, and with four points they finished third in Group F, one point ahead of the Portuguese side. Third place meant a transfer to the Europa League round of 32. Borussia Dortmund topped the group with 14 points, two ahead of Real Madrid, after the two sides drew 2-2 in Madrid on the same evening.

What came next for both clubs

In the Europa League round of 32 in February 2017, Legia were drawn against Ajax. The tie was settled by a single goal from Nick Viergever, and Ajax went through 1-0 on aggregate. Back home, Legia went on to win the 2016-17 Ekstraklasa, the club’s 12th Polish championship and their second in a row.

Real Madrid’s season ended far more grandly. Zinedine Zidane’s side went all the way to the final in Cardiff on 3 June 2017 and beat Juventus 4-1, with two goals from Cristiano Ronaldo and one each from Casemiro and Marco Asensio. Real Madrid became the first club to retain the trophy since the competition was renamed the Champions League, which made the point dropped in an empty stadium in Warsaw look even more remarkable.