The journey continues! FC Bayern sealed their place in the Champions League finals tournament in Lisbon thanks to a dazzling display on Saturday evening. The German record champions beat Chelsea 4-1 in the second leg of their last-16 tie. “I was very happy. We wanted to win and pick up from where we left off, and the team did that very well,” said coach Hansi Flick.
The men from Munich will now meet Barcelona in the last eight on 14 August. “There’s great excitement. We’re in very good form and head to Portugal with a lot of confidence,” commented David Alaba. fcbayern.com has collated the post-match reaction.
The reaction to the Chelsea match
Hansi Flick: “I was very happy. We wanted to win and pick up from where we left off, and the team did that very well. Chelsea have an exciting team with immense pace in attack, but we did brilliantly – the first 30 minutes were top-class. Chelsea didn’t have a chance. What marks out this team is that they stand together on the pitch as a team. As a coaching staff, we exemplify that. I can’t fault much today. Now it’s important that we recover and then fly to Portugal tomorrow. We’ll prepare well and hope that we can show our strengths again. We want to bring intensity and our qualities into the game against Barcelona as well.”
Thomas Müller: “We were well aware that we had an advantage with the first-leg result and also with the confidence that we currently have in the team. We don’t want to blunder through, we all wanted to prove that we weren’t letting up. We have time until the next game on Friday, so there was no need to conserve energy. Now it’s full steam ahead! We’re marching from record to record at the moment. I don’t know how many games we’re unbeaten now. We go into most games as favourites but you have to win the games in the first instance. That’s about more than just talent. But in one game at this level, anything can happen, even if Barca have had problems lately. And runs can go down the drain then if you don’t hit the level you need to.”
Robert Lewandowski: “The most important thing is that we attacked well and had fun. We know we had to get into our rhythm straight away and we did that really well. That was important for the rest of the tournament, too. We have to play well as a team. Barcelona are always dangerous. We need to show our quality.”
David Alaba: "On the whole, we can be pleased. It was our first game after a month. It's not always so easy to find one's rhythm straight away, to get back into the swing of things. We were aware of that beforehand. We worked very well in training. This is the result. In the next few weeks it will certainly become much more intense. We want to continue to train well in Portugal so that we'll be ready next week. Barcelona have a good team with very good individuals, but we want to stand up to them. We're really looking forward to it. We're doing very well and we're going to Portugal with a lot of confidence. We don't need to hide."
Niklas Süle: "I'm very happy, it's a great day for me to have made my comeback after such a long time. I really wanted to play with the lads again, and now I'm glad that my time of suffering is over. I hope everything is okay with Jérôme [Boateng], we need him in the competition. We've got a great team spirit, and that's reflected in the results and in the way we play.”
Leon Goretzka: "With the longer break it obviously wasn't easy. But we handled the situation very well and were on top in the game. Of course not everything was perfect yet, but we will work on that. It is a very special format, the tournament is like a European Championships or a World Cup. We are excited for the journey, we will prepare well and then we will see how it goes."
What the opponents said
Frank Lampard, Chelsea head coach: "It was an interesting game. Of course it's disappointing that we lost. We have many young players, but Bayern have players with hundreds of Champions League games under their belts in their squad. Many expected us to lose, but we can congratulate ourselves for what we showed."
We've summarised the best moments from the match here:
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