Cristiano Ronaldo opened the scoring for Manchester United in the 26th minute with a header from a cross by Wes Brown, but Frank Lampard equalised shortly before half-time.

Edwin van der Sar then saved Nicolas Anelka's effort from Chelsea's seventh kick to secure Manchester United's third European Cup title.

[20] The other venues in contention were the Estadio Olímpico in Seville, the Olympiastadion in Berlin, Wembley Stadium in London, and the Stadio Olimpico in Rome,[21] which was chosen to host the 2009 final.

The FieldTurf was removed after Russia's UEFA Euro 2008 qualifying match against England on 17 October, but the first grass pitch laid was deemed to be too bumpy.

"[25] UEFA's director of communications, William Gaillard, said the pitch might not look as good as they had hoped to television audiences, but was confident that it would be fine to play on.

[31] They travelled to Roma for the final group game, in which both teams were already guaranteed to progress; it finished as a 1–1 draw, with Gerard Piqué scoring his second goal for the club before Mancini's equaliser.

[46] Two days later, manager José Mourinho left Chelsea by mutual consent,[47] and was replaced by their director of football, former Israel national team coach Avram Grant.

The first leg was held at the Şükrü Saracoğlu Stadium in Istanbul, and ended in a 2–1 defeat, as Deivid made up for an early own goal by scoring the winner nine minutes from time after Colin Kazim-Richards' equaliser.

[58] The first leg at Anfield was a 1–1 draw, in which Chelsea got a 95th-minute equaliser through a John Arne Riise own goal after Dirk Kuyt had put Liverpool 1–0 up just before half-time.

[59] Chelsea won the second leg 3–2 after extra time, with two goals from Didier Drogba and one from Lampard sending the Blues through to the first Champions League final in their history.

[60] As part of the marketing for each Champions League final since 1997, UEFA commissions a unique design concept inspired by the cultural and historical heritage of the host city.

[61] The design was based on a colour scheme of deep red and gold, inspired by the predominant colours of Red Square, the Kremlin and the gold domes of Moscow's cathedrals,[62] and featured images of the Moscow skyline, as well as the UEFA Champions League logo and trophy rendered in a Russian artistic style, with text in a font similar to Cyrillic script.

[67] Manchester United chief executive David Gill expressed disappointment that his club had only been allocated 21,000 tickets for their supporters, claiming that they could have potentially sold up to 100,000.

[73] Although the two clubs claimed to have sold most of the 42,000 tickets allocated to them, only about 25,000 fans were said to have travelled to Moscow from the United Kingdom, with about 110 charter flights arriving ahead of the game.

On behalf of 2007 champions Milan, their technical operations director and former player Leonardo, and club director Umberto Gandini presented the trophy to UEFA president Michel Platini, who passed it on to the Mayor of Moscow, Yury Luzhkov, for it to be displayed in five cities around the country – Kazan, Yekaterinburg, Krasnodar, Saint Petersburg and Samara – before returning to Moscow ahead of the final.

The ball was unveiled at a ceremony in Moscow's Manezhnaya Square, attended by UEFA General Secretary David Taylor, former Germany player and coach Franz Beckenbauer, final ambassador Rinat Dasayev and Russian Football Union president Vitaly Mutko.

His team was completed by fellow Slovak assistant referees Roman Slyško and Martin Balko, and fourth official Vladimír Hriňák.

[86] Ferguson hoped his substitutes might have a big impact on the match, just as Teddy Sheringham and Ole Gunnar Solskjær did in 1999, when the pair came off the bench to help Manchester United come from behind and beat Bayern Munich.

The day before the match, Chelsea manager Avram Grant predicted that the game would throw up few tactical surprises due to the two teams' knowledge of each other from the domestic league.

[90] Captain John Terry (dislocated elbow) and striker Didier Drogba (knee) also recovered from injuries suffered against Bolton to start the match.

Wayne Rooney delivered a long ball into the path of Ronaldo and the United goalscorer placed his cross on the head of the diving Carlos Tevez, only for Čech to deny him.

[95][96] Chelsea's failure to clear the loose ball gave Michael Carrick the chance to extend his side's lead, but Čech was again equal to the task with another save.

The ball's change in direction caused Van der Sar to lose his footing, leaving Lampard, who had made a run from deep, with a simple finish.

[95] At the end of the first half, Sir Alex Ferguson confronted referee Micheľ, "jabbing out an angry finger and spitting out a few choice words".

[95][96] The Ivorian striker came very close to turning Joe Cole's low cross home for the winner four minutes from time, but fired wide.

[101] In preparation for the penalty shoot-out, both clubs made last-minute substitutions; Manchester United brought on Anderson in place of Brown, while Chelsea took off Makélélé in favour of Belletti.

[121] Buck also confirmed plans to trim the Chelsea squad by selling at least three players, and said that discussions were due to take place regarding Drogba's future with the club, after the striker reportedly expressed a desire to leave earlier in the season.

[127] As UEFA's representative at the Club World Cup, Manchester United entered the tournament at the semi-final stage, where they beat 2008 AFC Champions League winners Gamba Osaka 5–3.

[131] The ITV broadcast was led by Steve Rider, with Clive Tyldesley commentating, David Pleat as an analyst, and Andy Townsend and Mark Hughes as in-studio pundits.

[132] Sky's team consisted of presenter Richard Keys, joined in the studio by Graeme Souness and Jamie Redknapp, and Ruud Gullit via phone, with commentary from Martin Tyler and analysis from Andy Gray.