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Bayern Munich wins 2019-20 UEFA Champions League

Kingsley Coman’s second-half header gave the Germans a 1-0 victory over Paris St.-Germain, and their sixth title in European soccer’s top club competition.

Bayern Munich became the champions of Europe for a sixth time in an empty stadium when they defeated the first time finalists French club Paris Saint-Germain 1-0 in the UEFA Champions League final at the Estadio da Luz, Lisbon on Sunday, 23rd August 2020. Winger, Kingsley Coman who started his career at Paris Saint-Germain academy headed the decisive goal in the 59th-minute at the far post from an accurate cross from Joshua Kimmich to leave the French giants still searching for that elusive Champions League title.

Both Bayern and Paris had a comfortable 3-0 win in the Semi-Finals against Lyon and RB Leipzig respectively. However, it was a hard fought final between the two European giants, where a 59th minute Kingsley Coman header proved to be the difference in a high-octane, albeit low scoring final.

PSG’s two attacking superstars Neymar and Kylian Mbappe failed to produce their best and missed many goal-scoring opportunities. It was later Kingsley Coman, a French international who scored the decisive goal. This has been PSG’s best Champions League campaign but this will not ease the pain of defeat for the players or coach Thomas Tuchel.

Zinedine Zidane was the last French player to score a winner in a UCL final back in 2002.

This win also completes a continental treble for Bayern’s manager Hans-Dieter “Hansi” Flick who joined Bayern Munich as an assistant coach on 1st July 2019, and then later promoted to the interim manager position when Niko Kovač left. Bayern won 2019–20 Bundesliga, 2019-20 DFB-Pokal and the 2019-20 UEFA Champions League under his command. Flick also illustrated his ability to make the big decisions by selecting Coman ahead of the influential Ivan Perisic in the UCL final.

Liverpool, the defending champions last season, along with the other finalists, Tottenham Hotspur – were eliminated in the round of 16, following defeats to Atlético Madrid and RB Leipzig respectively.

With 1-0 win, Bayern became just the third side in Champions League history to hit the 500-goal mark in the competition (500 goals in total), after Barcelona (517) and Real Madrid (567).

Notably, each of the past seven teams competing in their first European Cup/Champions League final have all lost, with the last first-time winners being Borussia Dortmund in 1997 against Juventus.

During their 2019-20 campaign, Bayern Munich became the first team to win any European competition with a 100% winning record by winning all the 11 matches in the season. Bayern were last European champions back in 2013. Now their tally of six title victories puts them level with Liverpool. Only Real Madrid (13) and AC Milan (7) have won more.