Dele Alli, right, celebrates giving Tottenham the lead against Real Madrid with Kieran Trippier, who supplied the cross for the goal. Photograph: Laurence Griffiths/Getty Images
To put this result in perspective, it had been five years since Real Madrid last experienced what it was like to lose a Champions League group game. They had won this competition three times out of the past four seasons and, though it didn’t particularly feel that way here, don’t discount the possibility of that famous old pot returning to the Bernabéu again next May. Not yet, anyway.
However, this was the night when the most successful club side in Europe found out the hard way why Mauricio Pochettino and his players have attracted so much acclaim over the past few years. It was the night Dele Alli nutmegged Sergio Ramos and, by the end, Cristiano Ronaldo could be seen dragging his fingers down his cheeks in frustration. For Spurs, it went better than they could possibly have dared to hope and, without exaggeration, sparked the sort of euphoria that should embolden them now to think they can actually win this competition.
Yes, let’s not get carried away, but what other conclusion is there when they have taken apart the 12-times winners? “It wasn’t that we played badly,” Zinedine Zidane, Madrid’s manager, said. “We just came up against the better team.”
Dele Alli of Tottenham Hotspur scores his side’s second goal via a big deflection off Sergio Ramos, left. Photograph: Michael Zemanek/BPI/Re/Shutterstock
Dele Alli and his Spurs team-mates applaud the fans after a famous victory. Photograph: Tom Jenkins for the Guardian
Real Madrid’s Cristiano Ronaldo pulls a goal back for the visitors, via Eric Dier’s left boot. Photograph: Adrian Dennis/AFP/Getty Images
Christian Eriksen clips in Spurs’ third. Photograph: Dylan Martinez/Reuters
Eriksen celebrates. Photograph: Tom Jenkins for the Guardian
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