Leverkusen, who had been unbeaten in 51 matches across all competitions in the season, became the first German side to lose a UEFA Cup/Europa League final since Werder Bremen in 2009.

[10] In Atalanta's opener of the group stage, they faced Raków Częstochowa at the Stadio di Bergamo and won 2–0, with goals from Charles De Ketelaere and Éderson.

[13] On matchday 4, Atalanta defeated Sturm Graz in the reverse fixture at the Stadio di Bergamo, with a goal from Berat Djimsiti.

[17] In the second leg, Atalanta defeated Sporting CP 2–1, with goals from Ademola Lookman and Gianluca Scamacca cancelling out Pedro Gonçalves' opener to win 3–2 on aggregate and advance to the quarter-finals.

In the first leg, Atalanta produced a 3–0 away win at Anfield, with a brace from Gianluca Scamacca and a goal from Mario Pašalić, ending Liverpool's 34-game unbeaten run at home across all competitions.

[21] In the second leg at the Stadio di Bergamo, the hosts defeated Marseille 3–0, with goals from Ademola Lookman, Matteo Ruggeri, and El Bilal Touré.

[10] In Leverkusen's opener of the group stage, they faced BK Häcken at the BayArena and won 4–0, with goals from Florian Wirtz, Amine Adli, Victor Boniface and Jonas Hofmann.

[25] On matchday 4, Leverkusen defeated Qarabağ in the reverse fixture at the Tofiq Bahramov Republican Stadium, with a goal from Victor Boniface.

[30] In the quarter-finals, Leverkusen were drawn against English club and reigning Europa Conference League winners West Ham United.

In the first leg, Leverkusen produced a 2–0 home win at BayArena, with two late goals coming from Jonas Hofmann and Victor Boniface.

Leverkusen won 4–2 on aggregate and progressed to the Europa League final, while also setting a new European unbeaten record of 49 successive games, surpassing the Benfica side that was managed between December 1963 and February 1965.

[37] In the 12th minute, Atalanta went in front after Teun Koopmeiners played a through-ball to Davide Zappacosta who then played the ball low across from the right where Ademola Lookman was lurking, and the Nigerian managed to run in front of Exequiel Palacios and strike the ball into the top left-hand corner of the net to give the Italian side the lead.

Lookman doubled Atalanta's lead fourteen minutes later, after collecting the ball and dribbling past Granit Xhaka before striking his effort into the bottom right-hand corner of the net to make it 2–0.

In the 75th minute, Lookman completed his hat-trick after receiving the ball from Gianluca Scamacca on the left before managing to find himself space and get a shot away, which ended up in the top right-hand corner of the net.

This was also the biggest margin of defeat for a German team in a major European final match since the 1993 UEFA Cup, when Borussia Dortmund lost 3–0 to Juventus in the second leg.