Paris Saint-Germain have been crowned Champions League winners for the second consecutive season after defeating Arsenal on penalties in a gripping final played at the Puskás Aréna in Budapest on Saturday evening.
The Match
The game got off to a dream start for Arsenal. Just five minutes in, Kai Havertz put the Gunners ahead with a cool finish, sending the thousands of Arsenal fans in the stadium into raptures. It was a fitting opener for a side that had gone the entire Champions League campaign without a single defeat — an extraordinary achievement for a club making its first European final since 2006.
PSG dominated possession throughout the first half but found Arsenal’s defensive organisation frustratingly difficult to break down, going into the interval trailing 1-0.
The equaliser came just past the hour mark. Ousmane Dembélé — who had spoken before the final about his team being “hungry for victory” — stepped up from the penalty spot on 64 minutes and converted calmly to make it 1-1. Despite both sides creating chances in the second half, neither could find a winner, and the match went to extra time.
The additional 30 minutes failed to produce a goal, and so the destination of the trophy came down to a penalty shootout — where PSG held their nerve to lift the trophy for the second year in succession.
The Road to the Final
PSG’s path to Budapest was formidable: they knocked out Chelsea in the Round of 16, Liverpool in the quarter-finals, and Bayern Munich in the semi-finals.
Arsenal’s route was no less impressive. They eliminated Bayer Leverkusen in the last 16, then Sporting Lisbon in the quarters, before dispatching Atlético Madrid in a tense semi-final. The Gunners also came into the final having just ended a 22-year wait to reclaim the Premier League title under Mikel Arteta — a side at the absolute peak of their powers, chasing an unprecedented domestic and European double.
The Storylines Around the Final
Before kick-off, Bayern Munich midfielder Joshua Kimmich revealed he was supporting Arsenal, saying he hoped his German national team colleague Kai Havertz would lift the trophy — and that success at club level would benefit the German squad ahead of the upcoming World Cup.
The referee for the final was experienced German official Daniel Siebert, assisted by Jan Seidel and Rafael Foltyn, with Swiss referee Sandro Schärer as fourth official and Bastian Dankert in the VAR room.
The final also carried a special significance for Albanian football fans across the region — while no Albanian players featured on the night, both clubs have historically had players of Albanian heritage in their squads, a connection that added a personal dimension to the occasion for many supporters from Kosovo and North Macedonia.
PSG’s Place in History
With this victory, PSG join an extraordinarily exclusive club. They become the first team since Real Madrid in 2017 and 2018 to successfully defend the Champions League title — a feat that underlines Luis Enrique’s side as one of the great European club teams of the modern era. For Arsenal and Arteta, the defeat will sting deeply. But a Premier League title and a Champions League final in the same season marks a remarkable transformation for a club that spent years on the fringes of Europe’s elite.
