Brown, Solanke, Viveash on Chelsea's triumph
Monday, April 13, 2015
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Isaiah Brown said he was happy John Terry's faith in Chelsea FC was well placed as he, Dominic Solanke and manager Adi Viveash digested their UEFA Youth League triumph.
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Isaiah Brown, Chelsea captain
It's a great experience for me and something I never thought would happen. It was our goal to win the Youth League at the start of the season and today we did that. We had many difficult games, every team is tough in their own way, but Shakhtar are a great side with great players and were hard to play against.
In the second half we upped it by 5% and that's why we're champions. All of the first-team players wished me luck [yesterday, Brown having been on the bench against Queens Park Rangers FC] – they knew we could do this. John Terry said so on Instagram, he's a nice guy, and José Mourinho too.
Dominic Solanke, Chelsea forward
It's a dream come true. We've worked hard all season in this competition and won most of our games, losing only one, and we all put in a great shift to get here. We were always confident going into the final and we produced what we needed to.
Shakhtar are a very organised team and they made it hard. They equalised just before half-time, which was difficult for us, but we came out in the second period ready to go and managed to get a few more goals. It's a tough task to get into the first team at Chelsea, but you've got to keep working.
Adi Viveash, Chelsea manager
It was a three-part game. We started well, got the goal; then Shakhtar really put their foot on the accelerator and we dropped our level, so they got a deserved equaliser; in the second half it was much more like us and we dominated the first 15 minutes as we did against Roma [in the semi-finals] and took the game away from Shakhtar. We got over the line in the end.
I have immense pride in the job the players and staff have done. It has been an incredible tournament and very, very difficult to win. We follow in the footsteps of an outstanding Barcelona team last year. For the players, they can remember for the rest of their lives that they were Youth League winners – the first team from England to do it.
We fly back tomorrow and then most of these players are involved in the FA Youth Cup final [nine of the 11] next Monday at Man City, then the following Monday at home. Hopefully what happened today will spur them on to complete a cup double.
