Smith hails heroes of Florence

Walter Smith praised his side's "fantastic performance" after Rangers FC won through on penalties against ACF Fiorentina to their first European final in 36 years. But, having seen his team unable to crack a resolute defence, home coach Cesare Prandelli said the Viola did not get what they deserved for putting Rangers under such intense pressure. uefa.com heard from both camps.

Cesare Prandelli, Fiorentina coach
This great adventure is over and we have to accept the result even if we surely deserved more. We gave everything we had trying to score until the last minute of extra time. Football is like this and today a team who focus on defending from the first to the last minute were rewarded. I'm sure we deserved to reach the final. Rangers came here just to stop us playing our best football and got the result they wanted. I have nothing to say to my players. The game would have been more entertaining if we were facing a team ready to play a bit more. We dominated the possession and the match, especially in the second half and in extra time, but unfortunately we did not manage to score the goal we deserved. We are all disappointed but we have to forget this game quickly because we have an important goal to achieve in the league. We have to continue on this path because we proved once again we have the right approach.

Walter Smith, Rangers manager
It was a great result tonight but I think we have done well during the whole campaign, showing great determination and spirit. Reaching a European final is a fantastic result for everybody connected to the club and for our fans. We knew Fiorentina would put us under pressure because they always do that when they play at home and tonight they played a good game. However, the level of commitment to keep it at 0-0 was absolutely fantastic. I'm delighted David Weir could achieve this at this late stage in his career. He was returning from injury and gave great support to the team with a fantastic performance in defence. Nacho Novo is one of our best penalty takers but everyone did well to keep their nerve after our first miss from the spot. Dick Advocaat achieved a great result with Zenit and I'm happy for him as a former Rangers man. I look forward to facing them in the final. I don't think Fiorentina could have done much more than they did. They put us under severe pressure but our defence were fantastic. We are a difficult team to score against. Right now I'm not thinking about winning trophies but just enjoying the fact that we are going to Manchester.