Aguirre satisfied by Atlético response
Wednesday, October 22, 2008
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Club Atlético de Madrid coach Javier Aguirre was relieved his side earned a 1-1 draw against Liverpool FC having felt the match had slipped away from them in the first 45 minutes but Rafael Benítez cut a more dejected figure.
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Javier Aguirre, Atlético coach
You want to win and you try to win every game you play, but in the circumstances I'm happy with the result. We will see later in the group if a draw was good enough. We had a good talk and sorted a few things out at half-time. We said that it was vital we didn't lose another home game and in the second half we played further up the pitch. We were much better or livelier than in the first half – when I couldn't see us getting back into the game. The team played with more conviction and showed more belief in their ability.
I get the feeling that Sergio Agüero isn't quite 100 per cent because he is tired. We will try to work through this. As a professional, I accept criticism. It is normal that people start asking questions after a run of three defeats. That's the way the game operates. Things haven't gone well for us in the league – maybe we haven't had the rub of the green – and it's natural that I'm the one everybody looks to in this situation. It takes only three or four bad results to call everything into question.
Rafael Benítez, Liverpool manager
We had control in the first half and part of the second. I'm disappointed because we had chances to kill the game. We were playing well and had control until the final third. Then we tried to be too precise. You have to finish and get the second goal – then they can't play on the counterattack. We had plenty of situations in and around the box and should have made more of them. It's a positive result, it's one more point and we're not in a bad position but when you concede in the 83rd minute you have to be disappointed. The entrance of Sergio Agüero gave more depth to their play and we defended worse.
If you'd said to me before game that we'd have seven points at the end of it then it would be good. But after leading up until 83 minutes, and when you consider the chances we had, then I think we have lost two points. Robbie Keane, Steven Gerrard and Xabi Alonso were tired so we were trying to use players with fresh legs. We were trying to protect all of them by substituting them. It was a little bit of muscle problem for Robbie, Gerrard is okay – he was really tired – and Alonso has a knock on his knee.