Ståle: - The players can be proud of themselves tonight…

After a tough battle against FC Barcelona on Wednesday in round three of the UEFA Champions League – which ended 2-0 to the Spanish champions – FCK coach Ståle Solbakken gave his verdict on a resilient Copenhagen performance:

by Joe Short

- The better team won. We had trouble in the first half for 20 minutes, as the tempo was too high for us. The second half: a tremendous performance. We had the same amount of chances as Barcelona [in the second half] and got used to the tempo. The players can be proud of themselves tonight. All in all I am satisfied. We lose with pride today; something you can learn a lot from in this game.

- Obviously if you have three or four chances you should get one of them. Some of the counter attack opportunities ended up as nothing, and in fact ended up as a counter attack the other way.

Asked about the standard of the Danish Superliga compared to La Liga, Solbakken was again pleased with his players:

- Our players learnt a lot today. They have shown they can play in La Liga, against La Liga opposition, which is of course good for confidence. We tried to play our game and learn from it. In my opinion it is a coach’s job to improve every player, and help them progress to the next step.

With the home tie against Barcelona in PARKEN in just two weeks time, Solbakken reflected on Copenhagen’s previous Champions League campaign, focussing on Manchester United:

- I hope it will be the same as in 2006, when we went to Old Trafford and got used to the tempo. We had 8,000, maybe even 10,000 supporters here tonight. I’m very proud of the Danes cheering on the side. Hopefully in PARKEN we will have four times that and even more noise.