Paulo Dybala had no choice but to learn to be patient. His father loved to play chess, and was only too happy to share that passion with his son. What he was not content to do was to lose. “He taught me how to move kings, queens and pawns,” recalled Dybala in an interview with Vanity Fair last December. “But he never let me win.”

“Chess teaches you to use your brain, to not rush, to move in a harmonic way,” continued the Juventus forward. “The same things happen in football. Sometimes, to succeed, you need to reflect. You need to understand what point you are up to in a game, get to know your opponent’s weaknesses, wait for others to make their move so you can exploit your own quality and strength to the maximum.”

Dybala has had to bide his time an awful lot this season. After starting the campaign in scintillating form, he struggled badly through a frustrating autumn, scoring just twice in 16 games. At times, a player who had been billed as a future Ballon d’Or winner could not even get into the starting XI. And then came a hamstring injury that sidelined him for five weeks – costing him the first leg of Juventus’ Champions League tie against Tottenham.

A less resolute individual might have succumbed to defeatism and despair. Not Dybala. He returned from injury and, after a pair of lacklustre cameos, found his way back into the starting XI against Lazio on Saturday. Anonymous for the first 90 minutes, he then popped up with a brilliant winning goal deep into injury time, slipping two defenders and holding off Marco Parolo before lifting the ball into the roof of the net. It was Juve’s first shot on target all game.

Tottenham, then, cannot say it wasn’t warned. The Premier League side had drawn 2-2 against Juventus in Turin, and took an aggregate lead when Heung-Min Son bundled the ball in from close range in the 39th minute at Wembley Stadium. That advantage was richly deserved, in a game the host had dominated right from the start.

And yet, Tottenham failed to build on it. Juventus, just like the young Dybala playing chess with his father, accepted its own limitations and stayed patient. When Spurs finally started to get sloppy, the Bianconeri punished their mistakes with aplomb.

Gonzalo Higuain grabbed the equaliser, redirecting a Sami Khedira header into the bottom corner. Criticised for missing a penalty, as well as several other opportunities during the first leg, this was nevertheless his third strike of a tie in which Juventus had often been on the back foot. Those critics looking for evidence to support his “big-game bottler” tag wouldn’t have found it here.

It was Dybala, though, who scored the winner. He had struggled to get into this game, just as he did against Lazio on Saturday. Despite being granted freedom to roam in the first half, he couldn’t find his way onto the ball during a chastening first half, and was quickly bundled off it when he did.

Tottenham could feel proud of the job it had done containing a player that its own manager had placed casually in the same breath as Lionel Messi. But here another quote from that Vanity Fair interview comes to mind.

“Building something is difficult, and destroying it very simple,” Dybala told the magazine. “It only takes a couple of screw-ups and you can demolish a whole life’s work.”

Or, more modestly, to destroy a promising Champions League campaign. Still reeling from Juventus’ first goal, Tottenham’s defenders allowed their focus to drift. For a moment, they lost sight of Dybala. That was enough for him to slip behind them and onto Higuain’s through ball.

He finished as coolly as a man removing chess pieces from a board. “Ball: left foot to right corner. Checkmate.”

Remarkably, this was Dybala’s first goal in European competition since last April, when he struck twice in Juventus’ 3-0 rout of Barcelona in Turin. The Bianconeri hope they won’t have to wait another 11 months for him to increase his Champions League tally.

For now, though, Juventus can celebrate and look ahead to the quarter-finals. It isn’t playing as well as it did on the way to two finals in the past three years, but perhaps it doesn’t matter? We were reminded again tonight that the team that plays the best football doesn’t always prevail. And, as Dybala continues to remind us, good things come to those who wait.

(Photos courtesy: Getty Images)

If Tottenham’s game plan was to simply prevent Juventus from getting a shot on target, then manager Mauricio Pochettino was likely ecstatic with how the first hour of Wednesday’s Champions League knockout match unfolded.

What followed in the second half, however, will keep the Argentine up for days and weeks to come.

Similar to its north London neighbour, Tottenham’s Champions League journey ended in the round of 16 – a phase in which Arsenal’s European dreams expired for seven consecutive years before the club failed to qualify this season – after quick-fire goals from Gonzalo Higuain and Paulo Dybala propelled Juventus into the next round.

(Photo courtesy: Getty Images)

But, unlike those Arsenal teams – whose hopes of advancing were often erased following first-leg encounters against powerhouses like Bayern Munich and Barcelona – this year’s quarter-finals were in Tottenham’s sights after a promising first leg in which the English side scored two valuable away goals during a 2-2 draw.

That result inspired talk that Spurs were coming of age, as did the first half of the second leg at Wembley Stadium when Tottenham dominated Juventus, a side that’s competed in the Champions League final in two of the last three years.

Tottenham’s excellent first-half performance was rewarded just before halftime when Heung-min Son’s scuffed shot floated into the back of Juve’s net.

And it wasn’t just that go-ahead goal that made it seem as if the Italian club was on its way out of the tournament, as Spurs had outclassed the visitors on multiple levels in the opening half:

However, Tottemham’s early success was followed by a disastrous three-minute spell in the second frame that won’t soon be forgotten by players, coaches, and supporters.

Juventus eventually broke free of Tottenham’s grip on the match after manager Massimiliano Allegri abandoned his back-three formation in favour of a traditional back-four scheme.

Needing two goals to advance, there was initially some confusion regarding Allegri’s decision to adapt to Tottenham’s relentless attack by removing Blaise Matuidi – arguably one of Juve’s best midfielders – for left-back Kwadwo Asamoah in the 60th minute, before replacing Medhi Benatia with another defender, Stephan Lichtsteiner, a minute later.

But while observers were scratching their heads in bewilderment, the gamble paid dividends almost immediately.

The new-look visitors stormed back into the encounter as Higuain scored from close range while Tottenham was caught ball-watching. Juventus then turned the tie on its head as Dybala capped off an unchallenged 20-yard run with an impeccable finish that goalkeeper Hugo Lloris could only watch helplessly. In less than three minutes, Spurs had found themselves on the ropes.

And while Allegri’s tactical change had shifted momentum, it was also perfectly suited to defend as Tottenham desperately attempted to even the match.

Still, the mission was far from complete in the 23 minutes plus stoppage time that followed Dybala’s superb strike. Pochettino introduced a pair of attack-minded players, Erik Lamela and Fernando Llorente, in an attempt to force extra time.

In fact, the hosts were inches from grabbing that valuable equaliser, but a pair of veteran Juventus defenders saved the day. When the dust finally settled, a vital interception from Giorgio Chiellini and a goal-line clearance from Andrea Barzagli had ensured the visiting supporters were singing songs of joy at England’s national stadium, dashing Tottenham’s European dreams in the process.