Carlo Ancelotti: "We have opted for an open match"

MADRID, 21 Feb. (EUROPA PRESS) -

The Real Madrid coach, Carlo Ancelotti, acknowledged that his team had "a cool head" to know how to recover from their bad start to the game this Tuesday against Liverpool in the first leg of the Champions League round of 16, a duel in which He bet that it would be "open" with his line-up and that he congratulated himself on the good night of his forward, especially a Vinicius Jr who he currently sees as "the most decisive player in world football".

"We suffered a lot at the beginning, I didn't expect to start like this, but fortunately, as almost always happens with this team, they have had a cool head and little by little they have been entering the game with the quality we have," Ancelotti said in the round. press.

The Italian celebrated that his forward was "very effective" and stressed that when they came out "of the local pressure" they always created "problems". "We have also improved the defensive aspect little by little because in the first part they hurt us on the left. In the second, the team has made the difference, their pressure has dropped a bit and we have managed the ball out better and we have looked for to those at the top who were very good tonight," he explained.

The Madrid coach joked about what he thought with a 2-0 down in the 14th minute. "I remembered Manchester City, but here we have improved because in the semifinals it was after 10 minutes," he said with a smile. "I thought the same thing was going to happen. The foreseeable thing was to suffer and there we said that we had to suffer and have a cool head and controlled emotions. The veterans have helped a lot in this aspect by asking for calm and remembering that the game was long", stressed.

On the approach, he tried to put an alignment "to play a different game" from the final in Paris. "I knew that scoring could be important and I have opted for a dangerous forward, we have opted to play an open game", confessed the man from Reggiolo.

In any case, despite the 2-5 draw, Ancelotti warns that they have only taken "an advantage in the first 90 minutes." "We have to handle the seconds well in Madrid. I still think that Liverpool is a very competitive team because they created a lot of problems for us at the beginning. We have to think the same, the tie is not over," the Italian pointed out.

"Winning here is not easy and doing it forcefully is even more complicated. We are satisfied, the team has shown that it is improving and that it has reached a good level in February after a difficult January to be at the top because the season does not stop" , added the Real Madrid coach.

Ancelotti was full of praise for Vinicius Jr, whom he currently considers "the most decisive player in world football". "There is no other with this continuity, dribbles, assists and goals. Hopefully I can continue like this", he wished.

He also praised Luka Modric, who was "the best Modric you can see in a game" and was "the key to coming out in a difficult moment", and Nacho Fernández. "He has complied in all aspects, he always complies because he has football intelligence at a defensive level like few others", he settled.