After FC Copenhagen’s 2-0 loss over Chelsea in the UEFA Champions League, head coach Ståle Solbakken was gracious in defeat during his post-match press conference:
by Joe Short
- We lost to a better team; they were stronger than us. We made too many technical errors. We had our good moments but when we had them we missed the last pass or we didn’t have the power to break through. I hoped we could have matched them (Chelsea) a little better in certain areas. I think that to be honest some of my best players maybe didn’t have their best day today.
- We lacked the cutting edge to create big chances and then they got that first goal. They had more quality with the final ball. They looked sharper and were quicker. Even saying that, I think some of my players will have a good feeling deep inside when they look back at the game in a few days because some of them played very well, but some of my players didn’t live up to how they’ve played before.
- On another day we could have been much closer to them. It was a little bit of the same story as it was last year against Marseilles, where we had periods of good play but also very bad. We were deservedly beaten tonight and we have to hold up our hands and say that Chelsea were two goals better than us.
- We really tried to prepare this year. We put a lot of effort and money in to make sure that we were ready. We paid tickets and hotel rooms for Rosenborg so they could come down and play us, so we did all we could to prepare for the game. One or two more games may not have changed much in our preparation.
Chelsea manager Carlo Ancelotti expressed his pleasure at his side preventing the Lions from controlling the play:
- Copenhagen will always try to press you, but we played really intelligently tonight. We didn’t give Copenhagen the possibility to press. We played high up the field and stopped them from playing their game.
A few of the FCK players were also on hand to offer their thoughts:
Zdenek Pospech: - What can I say; we lost to a better team. I am also angry over my yellow card. It was foul, but it was not a yellow. Now I have to sit out of the return match, and I'm pretty mad about it.
Mikael Antonsson: - It was a tough night, for they turned out - as expected - to be a really good team. Anelka of course revealed that he is not quite finished yet, but still a real class striker. It went OK for me, but as a defender your job is to stop two goals, so you are never satisfied.
Jesper Grønkjær: - We lost on the day to a better team. We had to hit our best game to get a good result; it didn’t happen and we must say that tonight the two-goal difference was a fair result.
