'Nobody who played in this game will forget it'

Germany coach Marco Pezzaiuoli said that "nobody who played in this game will ever forget it" after the tournament hosts beat the Netherlands 2-1 after extra time in the UEFA European Under-17 Championship final in front of a competition-record 24,000 crowd at Stadion Magdeburg. Substitute Florian Trinks's stunning free-kick decided the game with three minutes remaining, and Netherlands coach Albert Stuivenberg – whose side had led early on – thought it was a "fantastic final" despite his team's disappointment.

Marco Pezzaiuoli, Germany coach
First I have to say it was absolutely great promotion for football. Both teams played unbelievable football. It was a very difficult tournament, there were eight great teams here in Germany and the Netherlands played today very good football early on. But my team is unbelievable. We were very nervous early on, the Netherlands team played very well and went 1-0 up, but also at the start of the tournament against Turkey it went 1-0 and this team comes back every time. They don't want to lose. We had more luck than the Netherlands, both teams had a lot of chances. It was a youth game, we saw many defensive mistakes, many chances but both teams had a great tournament.

Nobody who played in this game will ever forget it. That is what we want and we hope everybody can build on this, they need to learn about playing in front of these spectators. As coaches we need to improve the players and I think they have improved in this tournament. We have two players who take free-kicks, Christopher Buchtmann and Florian Trinks. He [Trinks] practices this free-kick all the time, we know he has an unbelievable shot, and today he was lucky that he scored at the right time.

Netherlands coach, Albert Stuivenberg
Well I would like to start with congratulations for Germany. They have won all their matches so are the best team of the tournament. When I look at this match, I am very proud of my players. We started very well and were the best team. We were 1-0 up but had a great chance to be 2-0 when we hit the post. By the end of the half we were having problems because we were not doing our job defending, especially in midfield. In the second half I think we saw the same game. Our players were working very hard looking for the openings and there were some openings especially at the end of the second half, two chances for a header – Rangelo Janga I think. On the other hand Germany had chances as well.

It was a fantastic final to see for everybody – great promotion for youth football. For extra time, a lot of players were very, very tired. Especially our players because in the other matches we had to give everything but at the end it was very disappointing for us that a free-kick – I think 30 from metres – went in. A fantastic free-kick of course but we thought we could go to penalty kicks and then had a 50-50 chance but at the end we have nothing.