After 120 minutes of pure drama, magical moments and stunning performances, there is only one thing we know for sure: few will be sleeping in Milan tonight.
Last week’s first leg – which finished 3-3 – was incredible, but somehow this return match was even better.
Inter Milan started far the stronger of the two sides and raced into a 2-0 lead at half-time through Lautaro Martínez’s opener and Hakan Çalhanoğlu’s penalty.
Barcelona looked way off it in the opening 45 minutes and knew it needed something special in the second half to get itself back into contention – and that’s exactly what the Spanish giant produced.
In less than six minutes, Barça had leveled the scoreline through Eric García’s fine finish and Dani Olmo’s header, as the San Siro was stunned into silence.
Then, with the Blaugrana dominating the ball, the visitors thought they had scored a late winner when Raphinha fired a shot into the bottom corner of the net in the 88th minute.
That seemed to be it, there was no way Inter could muster enough energy to find another goal and Barça fans must have started looking at flights to the final in Munich.
But then, in the 93rd minute, Francesco Acerbi sent Nerazzurri fans into a frenzy after smashing the ball into the roof of Barcelona’s net to level the scores.
Acerbi, 37, was in tears and pointed to the sky after scoring his first ever Champions League goal as mayhem played out around him.
Extra-time then loomed for both sides, but it was Inter who got the better of it, spurred on by the home support.
The winning goal came in the 99th minute after brilliant hold up play by striker Marcus Thuram, who laid the ball off to Davide Frattesi in the box. The midfielder kept his composure to guide his shot into the corner of the net to send the Italian side into dreamland.
“What happened? I don’t know! I celebrated so loudly that my head was spinning,” Frattesi said after the game.
But, naturally, Barça wasn’t done and almost found another equalizer in the final moments of extra-time. First, Robert Lewandowski headed just over the bar from a couple meters out, before Inter goalkeeper Yann Sommer produced a world-class save to deny Lamine Yamal’s effort from nestling into the back of the net.
“I’m very happy, we played an incredible match. Which save will I remember? The last one on Lamine Yamal; he is a great player and, fortunately, it didn’t go in,” Player of the Match Sommer said.
“Many teams would have given up after going down 3-2, but we didn’t and managed to come back.”
After tonight’s win, you feel it was destiny for Inter Milan to reach the Champions League final where it will meet either PSG or Arsenal.
The second semifinal is set for Wednesday night and CNN Sports will be across all the action live once again.
Key Stat: This was the joint-highest scoring semifinal tie in Champions League history, along with Liverpool’s 7-6 win against Roma in 2018.
