AC MILAN - SEVEN TIMES EUROPEAN CHAMPIONS

Italy's AC Milan have beaten England's Liverpool in the final of the European Champions League. This is Milan's seventh European Cup and Champions League victory. Thirty-three-year-old forward Filippo Inzaghi secured victory over Liverpool with his two goals. Two years ago Milan and Liverpool met in one of the best Champions League finals in recent history in Istanbul. The only comparable final in terms of excitement was between Manchester United and Bayern Munich in 1999, when United scored twice in the dying minutes. In 2005 the Rossoneri were leading 3:0 at half-time, but Liverpool managed to get back into the game and went on to win on penalties. The biggest failure was Andriy Shevchenko who could not beat Jerzy Dudek.

Much water has flowed under the bridge since then. The Pole has surrendered his place to Jose Reina while Shevchenko has gone to London. However, 12 of the players who started the match in Athens played in the game two years ago. Milan had seven veterans of that match - Dida, Nesta, Maldini, Gattuso, Pirlo, Kaka and Seedorf, while Liverool had Finnan, Carragher, Riise, Xabi Alonso and Gerrard. Milan also had Brazilians Cafu and Serginho in the reserves while Liverpool had Kewell and Istanbul hero Dudek. Luis Garcia was ruled out with a bad injury. It is interesting that both teams had completely changed their attack. Milan played with just one man up front, Filippo Inzaghi, while Liverpool had Dutchman Dirk Kuyt.

Liverpool made the stronger opening, while Milan looked over-cautious. Both teams had chances in the first half but neither managed to score until the 45th minute. Inzaghi's goal was a freak. Just before the break Brazilian midfielder Kaka won a free kick 20 metres from goal; Pirlo took a long time before taking his shot. The ball hit Inzaghi's shoulder, wrong-footing Reina, and flew into the net. 

The two sides were evenly matched after the interval and the scoring opportunities dried up. Liverpool kept coming at Milan but did not manage to score. Time was in the Italians' favour. Inzaghi's second goal was more his style. He received the ball from Kaka in an almost offside position, went round Reina and shot into the empty net. The memory of Istanbul two years ago meant Liverpool still had a chance - there were 10 minutes left. Crouch hit a powerful shot just over the crossbar. Inzaghi had just left the field a hero when Agger flicked on the ball for Kuyt to head home. Liverpool ran out of time.

The British press thought that Liverpool had been cruelly robbed, as Milan's first goal was handball. Everyone was overjoyed in Italy, though. In the heat of victory Paolo Maldini even decided to continue his career, although he had said before the game that he was going to hang up his boots.

AC Milan trainer Carlo Ancelotti won the European Cup twice as a player for Milan and the Champions League once as trainer in 2003, but he said his feelings were unique this time. "It is the greatest of all our victories. Not many people thought we would do it, but we managed to achieve something truly extraordinary. Few of our supporters expected Milan to win such an important victory this season. I don't think anyone expected it," Ancelotti said.

His opposite number Rafael Benitez did not hide his disappointment. "We controlled the game in the first half, attacked and created some chances. However, we let in an unexpected goal from a deflection at the end of the first half. You have to make the most of your chances in football and score. When you win, you celebrate, when you lose, you have to think about the reasons and look to the future. You saw the quality of Milan's game for yourself and now we are thinking about how to improve our own game," the Spaniard said.

As always at such huge sporting events there were problems with the supporters. The Athens police detained 128 fans for attempting to get into the Olympic Stadium. Ninety of them, mainly from Britain, had been trying to get into the game with forged tickets while others simply didn't have tickets. The supporters were not formally arrested and no charges were made against them.

The day that AC Milan won their seventh Champions League, Xazar-Lankaran won their first Azerbaijani Championship, thrashing higher league new boys, Gilan from Zaqatala, in the final game of the championship. Everything had really been decided in the previous round when league leaders Neftci unexpectedly lost 2:1 to mid-table Olimpik from Baku. The Lankaranis made good use of Neftci's slip-up. They won to go two points ahead, depriving Neftci of the chance to win championship gold in their 70th anniversary year. 

As always, there was a scandal before the end of the championship. Neftci's leadership accused the referees in their defeat to Olimpik of unscrupulousness, backing up their charges with an audio recording of a conversation between the match referee, Imanxan Sultan, and referee Elcin Mammadov, who has been disqualified for life. The sides can be clearly heard on the tape discussing "additional money", "premiums", etc. In making the recording public, the Neftci leadership particularly wanted the Association of Football Federations of Azerbaijan (AFFA) to arrange for a replay of their key game against Olimpik. But the Oilmen failed, as AFFA did not go for this option: there was no proof that Imanxan Sultani's refereeing influenced the outcome of the Neftci-Olimpik match. The refereeing committee, led by its chairman Ali Huseynov, also shared this view. Imanxan Sultani said that the audio recording had been put together by Elcin Mammadov himself. Corruption in Azerbaijani football is a topic for a separate article, and there are probably dozens of similar incidents, which is why we don't play like the Italians. Nevertheless, Lankaran have won their first championship title, albeit with the whiff of scandal.