Abdoun takes pride from Olympiacos success

Djamel Abdoun felt Olympiacos FC had left the UEFA Champions League "on a high note" following a 2-1 Group B win against Arsenal FC, but while he looked ahead to the UEFA Europa League, goalkeeper Roy Carroll hoped lessons would be learned from the Greek champions away performances ahead of their next group stage campaign.

Djamel Abdoun, Olympiacos winger
We leave the Champions League on a high note, having won our last match. We played good football and we are very satisfied with ourselves tonight. It was not easy to come back after conceding a first-half goal. We were playing against a strong side, but football matches last 90 minutes. Our reaction was great and one must salute the players tonight. It was teamwork in action.

On a personal note, I am happy with my season so far, but the team is more important. A player is nothing without his team-mates. I try to give the maximum – that's what I have been doing since the start and for the time being everything is going well. It doesn't matter if a match doesn't mean anything – it's always a pleasure to compete in the Champions League, and we always feel that we have to give it our all on the pitch. As for the Europa League, it doesn't get started again until February, so we have the time to prepare and look to go as far as we can. But now what's most important is the upcoming derby against Panathinaikos this Sunday. We will try to win it, as it's very important for the club.

Roy Carroll, Olympiacos goalkeeper
We are disappointed that the campaign is over and we are out of the Champions League, but we have gathered nine points in a group with two good teams like Arsenal and Schalke, so the players should be proud of themselves, especially after tonight. [It was a] great result coming back from 1-0 down.

Some people think that this game was for nothing but for us it's for pride. We were playing at home and we want to win all our home games and that's what we did tonight. We scored a lot of goals in the Champions League. We started off slow this season, like we did last season, so next time in the Champions League we have to learn to start early in the blocks. The players did really well, we got three good results, but we've lost three games and that's the downfall. You have to try to win your home games and get three more points away from home. We have to keep that in mind in the Champions League.

We are all professional footballers – we know what we have to do [in the Europa League]. We have to wait and see who we play first and take each game as it comes. It's a new year, we got new players, a new coach – we all of us stick together and try to go as far as possible.