Manchester City manager Pep Guardiola praised the spectacular football his side played in the 4-3 Champions League semi-final first leg against Real Madrid on Tuesday, even if he failed to complete the match. completely satisfied with the ratio.
The thrilling encounter in which City have a two-goal advantage on three occasions, is only the second Champions League semi-final to see either side score three or more goals, after Dynamo Kyiv against Bayern Munich in 1999.
The standard of football is spectacular, with City particularly diving into every opportunity to please the Spaniard.
“For our fans around the world and Manchester City, we are very proud,” Guardiola told BT Sport.
“What we did with the ball and without the ball, creating chances and chances, I can’t ask for anything else. I told the players to rest. Both teams wanted to attack and have quality. quality to play ball great spectacle.
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“Congratulations to (Real coach) Carlo (Ancelotti) and his team for being so good. At the same time, we see for ourselves that we can be at their level.”
A stunning double, including a ‘Panenka’ penalty, from Real forward Karim Benzema, alongside brilliant individual effort by Vinicius Jr ensured the game remained.
The Frenchman has scored 41 goals this season in all competitions, making him only the fifth player to score more than 40 goals in a single campaign in Real’s history.
However, Guardiola feels that City – with goals from Kevin De Bruyne, Gabriel Jesus, Phil Foden and Bernardo Silva – should have put themselves in a much stronger position ahead of next week’s second leg, with The draw is still open.
“The moments where they got ahead and got back into the game in the first half, I think we had for them, because our build-up was so intense. Normally we’re very safe and very good.” he added.
“Unfortunately we conceded and couldn’t score any more. We went to Madrid to try to win the game.”
