Ajax stories – ‘Out of the wrestling ring, straight to a backstage monitor...’

Everyone has their own account of where they were and what they were doing on the night of 8 May, 2019 – a year ago on Friday – when Lucas Moura sent us into Champions League dreamland.

For WWE superstar and keen Spurs fan Finn Bálor, that evening involved crowding around a tiny screen with his family backstage at a WWE live event in Belfast, still in his wrestling gear just moments after successfully defending his prestigious Intercontinental title against fellow grappler Elias, to witness the historic closing minutes unfold in Amsterdam.

What happened in those moments – as Lucas slid home his hat-trick goal against Ajax in stoppage time to book our place in the Champions League Final – reduced the 38-year-old tough guy to tears.

“We were in Belfast, I was in a kitchen with the WWE catering team watching on a phone and I was hugging the catering guys, we were all crying!” Finn told us on a visit to our new stadium last summer. “My parents were there as well so it was an incredible occasion.

“I got back to the hotel that night, laid down with my phone to watch the manager’s interview, started crying again, watched the highlights and started crying again. The whole week was really surreal. I watched Lucas’ stuff with the Brazilian media too when he started crying as well and that got me going again!

“I’m a stubborn Irishman and I get a lot of flak for not showing emotion or not showing how I truly feel but man, that was probably the most emotional night of my life at that point!”

Finn has been on top of his game as part of the WWE NXT roster in recent months, with all the action televised live in the UK on Wednesday nights at 1am on BT Sport 1. Based in America, he made it to the Champions League Final with his brother last year – “we’re lifelong fans,” he smiled – and was back at Tottenham Hotspur Stadium to take in a Premier League match earlier this season.