Arsenal beat Real Madrid again to book Champions League semi-final spot in style

By Philip Duncan, PA, Madrid

Arsenal secured their first Champions League semi-final in 16 years after a historic 2-1 win against Real Madrid in the Bernabeu.

Bukayo Saka, who missed a first-half penalty, fired Arsenal into a 4-0 aggregate lead after 64 minutes, only for the holders to respond immediately when Vinicius Junior nicked the ball off William Saliba before he fired home.

Vinicius’ goal provided Real Madrid with some hope, but Arsenal held on to their three-goal advantage – following Declan Rice’s superb set-piece double at the Emirates eight days ago – before Gabriel Martinelli scored in stoppage time to make it 5-1 on aggregate and complete a memorable night in Spain for Mikel Arteta’s side.

Arsenal, who became the first English team to win twice at the Bernabeu following their victory here 19 years ago, will play Paris St Germain for a place in the final as they bid to be crowned European champions for the first time.

The buzz word ahead of Wednesday’s second leg was remontada – Spanish for comeback – with Jude Bellingham insisting Real Madrid were confident they could overturn Arsenal’s 3-0 lead.

But the focus of an electric period was on two contentious penalties – one that was awarded to Arsenal, and the other which the hosts were denied.

Prior to the two flashpoints a clearly offside Kylian Mbappe had the ball in the Arsenal net within two minutes and the disallowed goal only encouraged the home fans.

Yet it was Arsenal who had the best opportunities to open the scoring and both chances fell to Saka. On eight minutes, the England winger left David Alba tumbling to the turf before he unleashed a wicked shot on Thibaut Courtois’ goal which required a diving save.

Arsenal were awarded a penalty four minutes later when Raul Asencio was adjudged to have fouled Mikel Merino from Rice’s corner.

Referee Francois Letexier had not reacted but after he was urged to visit his pitchside monitor, he pointed to the spot.

Captain Martin Odegaard took the ball before handing it to Saka. But Arsenal’s star man fluffed an attempted Panenka with Courtois palming the poor penalty away with his left arm.

And 10 minutes later, Real thought they had a penalty of their own.

Rice grappled with Mbappe in the box and the France forward dropped to the deck. Letexier immediately blew his whistle and the Bernabeu erupted.

But Rice protested his innocence and a lengthy VAR check followed. In all, four minutes had passed from the initial foul before Letexier was asked to review his on-field decision. Another minute went by as the French official weighed up whether to overrule his own decision. He did and Arsenal survived.

Arsenal were happy to slow the game down – goalkeeper David Raya was booked for timewasting after 36 minutes – and a frustrated Real failed to muster a single shot goal in the first half. Indeed, it was Courtois who was called into action again at the other end as he denied Martinelli low to his left in first-half stoppage time.

The Spanish giants had now failed to score in three-and-a-half matches against Arsenal across the last 19 years. They needed at least three in the following 45 minutes to force extra-time.

But it was Arsenal who drew first blood as Saka atoned for his earlier miss. Saka and Odegaard were both involved in a brilliant build-up before Merino played the killer pass and Saka delivered the killer chip. In contrast to his dink from the spot, this time it worked, and the onrushing Courtois could do nothing to prevent Saka’s sublime finish from dropping into the net.

Real now required four goals to salvage anything from the tie, and they pulled one back immediately when Saliba was caught napping and Vinicius robbed the defender to haul Real level on the night.

At that stage, there were still 23 minutes to play, but, in truth, the 15-time European Cup winners never looked like scoring again.

When Mbappe hobbled off with 14 minutes remaining, Arsenal were all but over the line and the crowning moment came in stoppage time when Martinelli sealed a famous win.