BAYERN MUNICH OUT FOR REVENGE AFTER CRISTIANO RONALDO CAUSED REAL MADRID SCANDAL

Seven years later, they're still talking about.

On the night of April 18, 2017, Cristiano Ronaldo made history by becoming the first player to score 100 goals in the Champions League - but two shouldn't have counted. After scoring a brace in the quarter-final first leg to give Real Madrid a 2-1 lead over Bayern Munich on aggregate, Ronaldo bagged arguably the most controversial hat-trick in the competition's history.

Robert Lewandowski had put Bayern ahead on the night with a penalty, only for Ronaldo to respond with his first goal on 76 minutes. Real's advantage was chalked off again within 60 seconds after a calamitous Sergio Ramos own goal and then controversy ensued.

The steely Arturo Vidal, who was already on a yellow card, slid into a tackle on Marco Asensio, winning the ball before sending the Spaniard tumbling across the Bernabeu turf. Vidal already knew his fate but protested what was almost universally agreed to a very harsh second yellow card.

Carlo Ancelotti, incidentally, was in the Bayern dugout and after the incident happened right in front of him, he couldn't believe that his team were down to 10 men going into extra-time. The German giants already felt hard done by up to that point, and luck was certainly on the holders' side.

In the 104th minute, Ramos picked out Ronaldo with a pass from deep and following his composed chest control, he hammered a left-footed shot past Manuel Neuer. Bayern's defence - particularly David Alaba, who'd wisely pushed up before Ramos' pass swung in - looked across to the linesman in unison, but there was no flag.

Crucially, VAR wasn't in use and it was the millions watching at home who had the benefit of a replay. Ronaldo was indeed offside.

Five minutes later, a peak Marcelo burst through Bayern's exhausted midfield and defence to go two-on-one with Neuer. Ronaldo - who'd been stood in an offside position inside the visitor's penalty area - waited for his team-mate to draw the goalkeeper out and quickly pass to him before producing a simple finish to make it 5-3 on aggregate and complete his 'perfect' hat-trick.

Again, Bayern's players were adamant that the reigning Ballon d'Or winner was offside. Again, no flag.

Asensio soon produced a superb solo goal to end the contest late on and when Bayern walked off the pitch, they were shattered but showered with sympathy.

Your turn! Who'll go through on Wednesday - Bayern Munich or Real Madrid? Join the debate in the comments section

Maybe Piers Morgan, who'd go on to become a good friend of Ronaldo's, put it best. "Vidal wrongly sent off, Ronaldo 2nd goal miles offside. Bayern have been robbed," Morgan tweeted - back when it was called Twitter, of course.

Barcelona defender Gerard Pique didn't say anything, just offering some punctuation. "..." read his tweet.

Ancelotti - between his two spells in Madrid - raged at Hungarian referee Viktor Kassai after the final whistle, later fuming: "We played very well and I think we deserved more. The decisions penalised us a lot. Vidal's second card should not have been a yellow. There should be a referee with more quality in a game like this or put the video referee because there were too many errors.

"Maybe Vidal has to calm down but the second yellow card is a mistake from the referee. I'm not saying we would have gone through with a different referee but the referee had a bad game it would have been a different game with video replays. There are a lot of decisions that generate doubt but there is no doubt here - Vidal touches the ball, I saw it as it happened.

Marcelo even admits that he thought Ronaldo was offside, recently recalling the events in a podcast. "I did," the Brazilian - who now plays for Fluminense - laughed while appearing on PodPah last month. "I thought, 'Oh my god'. I looked at the linesman and when the linesman ran... Ah. It was offside, but go complain about it now."

Zinedine Zidane's men marched on to face Atletico Madrid and then Juventus in the final, and eventually became the first team to win back-to-back European Cups since Nottingham Forest in 1980. Fast forward to 2024 and with this year's semi-final tie finely poised at 2-2 after the first leg, Bayern and Real will meet again for what's set to be another thriller.

The likes of Jude Bellingham will be hoping to emulate one of Ronaldo's many memorable Champions League performances - while staying onside, too. Bayern, meanwhile, are out for revenge against at the expense of Ancelotti and it's fair to say that the Bundesliga heavyweights feel like they're owed a goal or two.

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2024-05-08T05:22:47Z dg43tfdfdgfd