Guardiola always believed in Bayern
Tuesday, April 21, 2015
Article summary
Josep Guardiola said he was always sure FC Bayern München could turn the tie against FC Porto and warned "we can play even better" after the 6-1 second-leg victory.
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Article body
• Josep Guardiola warns "we can play even better" after Bayern beat Porto 6-1
• Bayern overturn 3-1 deficit to make semis and Guardiola says he always believed
• Julen Lopetegui admits Porto were outclassed, marring an otherwise "excellent" run
• The semi-final draw takes place in Nyon from 12.00CET on Friday
Josep Guardiola, Bayern coach
We are very, very happy about this performance, especially after recent weeks when we had our problems scoring goals. We can play even better! In the second half they changed their system and we had our problems. In the first half they had no chances, in the second they had some. In the Champions League you can never switch off.
Even after the game in Porto I had the feeling that we could make it. You always make up the difference in your head. I always try to analyse our opponents. It was not such a big surprise how they played in Porto. They have a very good team, but today they were not able to reach their level.
Thiago Alcántara really played very well out there tonight. His strength is his mentality. After a year out, just imagine ... he is back and he's doing really well.
I don't care too much who our next opponents will be. We will try our best whether it is Real, Barça, Atlético, Juventus or Monaco, that doesn't matter.
Julen Lopetegui, Porto coach
We didn't play well in the first half. Bayern are one of the best teams in Europe and are one of the favourites to win the UEFA Champions League. We have to remember that in terms of experience, there are three or four hundred matches' difference between the two sides. Bayern are a fantastic team and we fought as hard as we could. We knew they'd try to make use of the flanks and we managed to stop them doing it so much in the second half.
We've lost by three goals overall in a competition where we've been excellent all season. We've got a young team and we'll bounce back. Bayern are an extremely strong team – the best in Europe in my opinion. We played well in the second half, but we weren't good enough to come back and go through to the next round. They eliminated us with their first-half display here.
