Slovakia coach tipping Hamšík for the very top

Ján Kozák, Slovakia coach
Marek Hamšík has been playing well for Slovakia for a very long time – he is one of the leaders of this team along with Martin Škrtel. His performance today was superb. He helped a lot in defence and scored a beautiful goal which was a major contribution to our victory. I don't know whether we will be here long enough for him to become one of the top players of the finals, but what we can say is that he has matured as a person and as a player at Napoli – he is ready to play for a very big club.

The match was very close and tense; nobody wanted to open up space and concede. We managed to score a goal with a brilliant piece of play from Vladimír Weiss and then Marek Hamšík got another from Weiss's set piece. At half-time we said it was only 2-0; we had things under control for a time, but we got tired. The last ten minutes seemed to last a very long time.

• How the match unfolded
• Hamšík's Slovakia one-two sends Russia reeling

Marek Hamšík, Slovakia midfielder
How good could I get? I don't know. I am happy with what I have done so far. I am sure there is room for improvement and we will see where things take me. This win was a very important victory for us; it opened up the way to the last 16. We don't have to worry too much about the England v Wales game. We have four or five days to recover and then we play the group favourites. I am sure it will be tougher than these two matches.

Vladimír Weiss, Slovakia midfielder
We knew that these three points were important today, and even though we maybe had less of the ball we put everything into it, and we won. For my goal, I took the pass on my left foot and knew that if I moved quick I could get away from the defenders, and then I just put it in. For the second, the coach has told us to take corners quickly; I saw that Marek was unmarked and he finished it incredibly.

Leonid Slutski, Russia coach
Did we choose the wrong starting lineup? No, I wouldn't say that because if the plan we had at the beginning had been executed, and if we had scored the first goal, it would have been a different game. After we went behind, we had to change our plan, especially the system in midfield.

Denis Glushakov, Russia midfielder
We lost, but I think we will have another good opportunity against Wales, so we should lift our spirits and get back to where we were. We need to move forward and give it 100% or even 200%, and then we will get a result. We don't have any other option against Wales – we have to win.

Fedor Smolov, Russia winger
The key moment was the strike by Hamšik – such goals are very rare and unfortunately that one flew into the back of our net. The only positive is that we still have a chance, and we have to make our fans happy, not only with the result but the performance. This is what we will try to do in the last match against Wales.