Proud Mourinho ready for final step

FC Internazionale Milano coach José Mourinho said his players "will fight hard to make their dream come true" after taking a significant step towards the UEFA Champions League final by defeating FC Barcelona 3-1 in their semi-final opener. Josep Guardiola offered no excuses for the loss, and will be looking to make amends when the tie concludes at the Camp Nou on Wednesday 28 April.

José Mourinho, Inter coach
We deserved this victory but Inter are still far from reaching the final. We still have a lot to do, we're going to play in Barcelona next week don't forget. Barcelona are the best team in the world when they play at home. We played very well tonight, our only regret is Barça's goal. We studied their way of playing, we knew what we had to do, but despite this we conceded from a defensive mistake.

In any case, we gave a fantastic performance with the right spirit. Anything can happen in football; we could even lose in Barcelona by conceding a lot of goals. However, I must underline that Inter have made their mark in Europe, winning five games in a row in the knockout phase, and if we don't win the Champions League this year I'm sure we'll win it in the near future.

I can only say good things about my players. We must be proud of our performance because we are a strong group and we have a dream. We must fight hard to make this dream come true. We have two choices for the game in Barcelona: get to the final in Madrid or leave Europe with our heads held high. Our chance of going through is 50%, just like before the first leg.

Josep Guardiola, Barcelona coach
We have no excuses. They were always looking to get in behind us and they have very quick attackers. They played in their style while we weren't as effective as we have been in other games. The pitch played very fast and we tried our best. They didn't make it easy for us at all.

Although we opened the scoring we weren't effective enough in the first half. Sure we had a long trip but the desire to get to a final overcomes that. We still have another chance in the second leg and we're going to do our best. We will attempt to play our attacking game at home and will be looking to move the ball quicker than we did tonight.