Richards wants Fiorentina to go all the way

• Micah Richards said he joined Fiorentina due to the strength of their squad
• Jasmin Kurtić expresses his "honour" at representing the Viola
• Lionel Mathis felt Guingam's 3-0 defeat was "hefty"
• Jérémy Pied says Guingamp's home games will now be crucial
• Next games: Dinamo Minsk v Fiorentina, Guimgamp v PAOK (2 October)

Micah Richards, Fiorentina defender
It was a great result for us tonight. We were a bit disappointed that we only drew at the weekend so tonight was good to start off with a win. Definitely it's nice to keep a clean sheet too, but this game also shows that we've got goals in this team and hopefully we can show that this season. We've got a hard group and teams that hurt us if we don't do it right, but tonight we did it right and it was a good performance from the lads.

It was nice to make my debut. The fans were cheering for me when I was warming up so it was a nice vote of confidence from them and I was glad to get out there.

It's going to be slow for my fitness to get there because I've not played as many games as I've wanted to of late so it's good to get as many minutes as I can so then I can hopefully break into that starting XI. It's my style of game that I like to get forward, run with the ball and get in behind so it's always nice when the fans get behind you.

I think we've got a really good squad and when I came here, that was the reason why I actually came here because I looked at the players and saw they've got a really good team. Sometimes it just depends on the luck of the draw, but I'm not going to say we can win the Europa League and I'm not going to say we can't, but we just want to go as far as we can go.

Jasmin Kurtić, Fiorentina midfielder
In the move that led to the opening goal, I just put the ball into the middle and fortunately [Juan] Vargas arrived to make it 1-0. From that moment on, the game became easier for us. It was a good first game of the season for me because we won, but it would have been a bad start if we'd lost – but that's football. We're on the right path now and we want to carry on this way. We're all happy with the way we played and with the three points.

It's easy to play together with [David] Pizarro and Borja [Valero] because the best players are also intelligent, they love to play with the ball and it's the same for me. They give me a great hand. I cried with joy when I signed for Fiorentina. It's an honour for me because this is the biggest club I've ever played for and I really want to give 150% for this club. [Mario] Gomez will get his goal sooner or later. We're all doing everything for the good of Fiorentina and the important thing is that the team does well, not whether Gomez scores or not.

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Vincenzo Montella, Fiorentina coach
I was pleased with my team's spirit. We looked for this win by playing football and we knew how to control the game. All of the new players showed the quality that we had seen in them and what led us to sign them. Even Gomez is like a new signing, considering he hardly played last season. He started well and sacrificed himself a lot. We worked hard on getting the balls into the box from the wings and this is another option for us.

Lionel Mathis, Guingamp midfielder
I think the game was pretty even, but when it was ten against 11, it was practically unplayable and then we conceded the third goal and I think that's a bit hefty. We had chances in the first half and their goalkeeper made a great save too.

Jérémy Pied, Guingamp midfielder
We had a plan to try to make things harder for them as the game wore on. The longer we managed that, the better it was for us, but the red card really hurt us and after that it became difficult. Like I said, we really wanted to be in this game for as long as we could and to try to prevent them from playing their game, like we managed against FC Girondins de Bordeaux, but it just didn't work out.

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We felt that we could get the ball moving forwards quickly; we could see plenty of gaps, particularly out wide and we tried a few things, changed a few things, but it's one of the basic rules of football that if you can't manage to go in front, then you're not going to change much.

I just hope we can do better in the next game. It's going to be decisive already because I've seen their [PAOK's] score [beating Dinamo Minsk 6-1] and of course we'll now take a look at the video of that match, but without any doubt, if we want to survive in this group, we've got to pick something up at home against all three of the other sides.

Benjamin Angoua, Guingamp defender
We're disappointed with the defeat of course, but we can't let it get us down for long because we already have our next game ahead and we need to shift our full attention to that. To be perfectly honest, I don't think you can say anything about us maybe not being well organised because the red card changed everything. It's hard to recover from something like that. But we are sportsmen; we are professionals and we'll do all we can to ensure we do better next time.