GREECE: SOCCER/FOOTBALL - Post match reactions and celebrations after AC milan defeat Liverpool in the Champions League final in Athens

Record ID: 712199

  • Title: GREECE: SOCCER/FOOTBALL - Post match reactions and celebrations after AC milan defeat Liverpool in the Champions League final in Athens
  • Date: 25th May 2007
  • Summary: (SOUNDBITE)(Italian) AC MILAN CAPTAIN PAOLO MALDINI SAYING: "Beautiful. Beautiful. I mean even if we won (the Champion League) before, to play in the final again and feel these emotions and excitement is absolutely a fantastic feeling. I am proud of what I have achieved in such a difficult season."
  • Embargoed: 9th June 2007 13:00
  • Keywords:
  • Location: Greece
  • Country: Greece
  • Topics: Sports
  • Reuters ID: LVA8GP2R762GYA4J695F8B0MT13F
  • Story Text: Victorious AC Milan coach Carlo Ancelotti says his team have helped restore credibility to Italian football by beating Liverpool in the Champions League final in Athens.

    Filippo Inzaghi denied that the first of his two Champions League-winning goals for AC Milan on Wednesday (May 23) was a fluke.
    "Sometimes it works (the way I shot that goal) like for example in last year's derby and against Empoli. Of course you also need a good dose of luck. But Pirlo was very good in passing me the ball," said Inzaghi with a grin.
    Whether it was deliberate or not, there is little doubt it was the turning point of the match, which Milan won 2-1, and it was fitting that Inzaghi was involved.
    The 33-year-old has suffered from a number of injuries over the last couple of years and missed Milan's defeat on penalties by Liverpool in Istanbul two years ago.
    Before the final, there was much debate about whether Carlo Ancelotti, the Milan coach, would play Inzaghi or Alberto Gilardino up front. Inzaghi's double strike repaid his coach's confidence.
    Milan coach Carlo Ancelotti hailed his side's 2-1 win over Liverpool in Athens as a victory for Italian soccer.
    The 47-year-old said it would go some way towards restoring faith in the Italian game after last year's match-fixing scandal that saw four Serie A clubs punished, including Milan who were only reinstated in the Champions League on appeal.
    "Winning the Champions League is completely unexpected in a sense because we had to overcome so many difficulties," he said.
    "I wouldn't call this revenge for the scandal but I do think that Italian football suffered from it, especially Milan, so I would say this is good for Italian football in general. It will help us to regain some of our credibility."
    Ancelotti, who also led Milan to the Champions League title in 2003, stopped short of describing the win as revenge for Milan's defeat by Liverpool on penalties in the final two years ago in Istanbul but drew comparisons between the two games.
    "In Istanbul, the game was more open since we were immediately ahead and we scored several more goals. This made the game more bubbly. This game was tighter, more controlled from the first till the last minute."
    Ancelotti, who won the European Cup twice as a player for AC Milan, before becoming coach in 2001, declined, however, to be drawn on his future at the club.
    Liverpool coach Rafael Benitez paid tribute to his team's performance and said the English team had been unlucky.

    "I think that the first half we controlled the game. The first half we played really well and conceded a deflection, some bad luck. In the second half, we pushed forward and when you do you leave space between the lines and in the wide spaces and they have quality and that's the difference," he said.
    Delighted former Italian prime minister Silvio Berlusconi, Milan's club president, posed with the trophy on the team bus before the victorious squad departed for their hotel in the Greek capital. Minutes earlier the Milan team perfomed an impromptu dance for fans.
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