AS Monaco have reached the semi-finals of the Champions League after beating Borussia Dortmund 3-1 in their quarter-final second leg, for an aggregate score of 6-3.
The visitors came to the Stade Louis II eager to overturn a 3-2 deficit from the first leg at the Signal Iduna Park and trying to put last Tuesday’s traumatic attack on the team bus behind them.
However, their preparations suffered another setback as police held their coach back at the hotel, seemingly ‘without justification’, forcing kickoff back by five minutes.
Once the action got underway, it took the hosts only three minutes to open the scoring as Benjamin Mendy’s long-range effort was poorly parried by Roman Burki and the prolific Kylian Mbappe was on hand to slot the rebound into the net.
Nuri Sahin was unlucky to see his 14th-minute free kick hit the inside of the right post and bounce clear, and just three minutes later, Monaco were two to the good as Radamel Falcao made the most of a lacklustre defence to nod home unmarked.
Thomas Tuchel opted for an early substitution, taking off Erik Durm and bringing on Ousmane Dembele, and the 19-year-old made an instant impact as he increased his side’s incisiveness going forward, as well as pulling the strings in midfield.
Dortmund improved considerably and, even though they were unable to score in the first half, it took them just three minutes from the restart to get onto the scoresheet, Dembele crossing in for Marco Reus to smash his first-time effort into the net.
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