At first, there was anger.
“The penalty and the retake were scandalous,” said Borussia Dortmund advisor Matthias Sammer, who watched the game as a pundit for German television. “This is out of order.” Dortmund midfielder Emre Can was even more candid. 'The referee is to blame (for their Champions League elimination). That's it. He was arrogant. Our defeat was undeserved. We lost because of the referee.”
Blaming a higher, vexatious authority for your ills is a human reaction as old as the hills, and one could forgive the visitors their frustrations.
Chelsea's tie-winning second-half penalty, for a handball by Marius Wolf, looked like a harsh decision anyway and allowing Kai Havertz to retake it after his initial kick hit the post following encroachment from both sets of players was counter-intuitive if not nonsensical. But a scandal? Not really.
UEFA is well known for taking a more strident view on players sticking out arms and legs, and the VAR protocol explicitly calls for intervention after “encroachment by an attacker or defender who becomes directly involved in play if the penalty kick rebounds from the goalpost, crossbar or goalkeeper”. Since Dortmund midfielder Salih Ozcan had cleared the ball after running into the D as Havertz struck the penalty, the decision was rather straightforward. Hate the rule, not Danny Makkelie for applying it correctly.
As tempers cooled and captain Mats Hummels, an unused substitute on the night, posed for selfies with a few young Chelsea supporters, reactions became more nuanced.
His fellow defender Nico Schlotterbeck was unsure of the legality of those key moments but also made the point that Dortmund only allowed themselves to get “unlucky with ref” because they didn't score “one or two more goals” across this last-16 tie. They didn't, however, because they were “too passive in the first half” and unable to put real pressure on Kepa Arrizabalaga's goal when they were chasing the game after the break.
“They defended well and we couldn't really get behind them,” Schlotterbeck added, referencing Jude Bellingham's snatched volley as the only real attempt the visitors mustered at Stamford Bridge after the break.
It wasn't Dortmund's night.
The team bus had got stuck in traffic outside the ground for 20 minutes, necessitating a delayed kick-off and a bit of anxiety. Then Julian Brandt, Dortmund's most influential player in recent weeks, damaged his hamstring with less than five minutes gone and had to go off. “That hurt us a lot,” Schlotterbeck said, “he's been in great form us, absolutely outstanding.”
Brandt's replacement, Giovanni Reyna, then reminded us why he's not starting games at the moment. The 20-year-old took a long time to get going after his surprise early introduction and only offered isolated flashes of quality on the ball.
Having a full squad of players to choose from after the winter break had been one of the key factors in the 10-win streak Dortmund had sought to extend as they brought a 1-0 first-leg lead to west London. A healthy dose of good fortune in key moments and talismanic goalkeeper Gregor Kobel also played a big role.
Lately, however, injuries have chipped away at them once more and performances have become more uneven as a result.
Kobel couldn't play last night after getting injured in the warm-up for Friday's game against RB Leipzig. Forwards Youssoufa Moukoko and Karim Adeyemi, the first leg's goalscorer, were badly missed when coach Edin Terzic tried to rustle up a counter-offensive. Cancer survivor Sebastien Haller can't yet last 90 minutes, and his deputy Anthony Modeste isn't trusted at this level. Attempts to play 18-year-old substitute Jamie Bynoe-Gittens through the middle as a false nine proved ineffective, and centre-backs Schlotterbeck and Niclas Sule were deployed as makeshift late-game strikers instead.
It all added up to very few threatening moments against a well-organised Chelsea back five and brought the paucity of Dortmund's bench options into sharp relief.
As midnight loomed, minds turned towards the Revierderby away to beloved neighbours Schalke on Saturday and the quest for a first German title since 2011-12. Dortmund, level on points with Bayern Munich, still have a good chance to keep up the pressure on the league leaders, injuries notwithstanding but this unhappy trip to England underlined just how small the margins of errors are for them.
Schalke on the Reis as they prepare for their hot dance with rivals Dortmund
They neither have Bayern's riches nor their depth of squad quality, to say nothing of the experience that comes from winning trophies every year. If they are to succeed domestically, almost everything needs to go right to an extent that it simply didn't at Stamford Bridge.
They were out of luck, out of options and ultimately, a little too out of form to 'punch up' effectively on Tuesday night.
There's no disgrace in accepting that reality.