Guardiola backing Barcelona for Berlin final - UEFA Champions League
 |
| AFP |
Bayern Munich coach Pep Guardiola is now backing his ex-club Barcelona to win the UEFA Champions League after his Bavarian giants bowed out 5-3 on aggregate in the semi-finals.
Guardiola's Bayern exited at the last-four stage for the second year running, despite ending Barcelona's 18-game unbeaten run with a 3-2 semi-final, second-leg win in Munich. Bayern were given an early glimmer of hope in their bid to overturn a three-goal deficit in Munich when the unmarked Medhi Benatia headed home on seven minutes at the Allianz Arena.
But Barcelona effectively booked their place in the Berlin final when Luis Suarez twice set up Neymar to score for the visitors before half an hour had been played. Bayern produced a rousing second-half performance with goals by Robert Lewandowski and Thomas Muller, but Barcelona advance to face either bitter rivals Real Madrid or Juventus in the final.
Having won 16 titles as a player, then a further 14 in four years as head coach at the Camp Nou, Guardiola is backing Barcelona to claim their first European crown since 2011 at Berlin's Olympic Stadium on 6 June. "I want to congratulate my players, I am really happy to be their manager on a day like today," said Guardiola, as Bayern denied Barcelona a first win in Munich at the fifth attempt.
"But I hope Barcelona can now win their fifth Champions League title in Berlin. You can only beat Barcelona when you take the ball away from them, with it they are so strong.
"We didn't make the most of our chances in the first leg, but here we did. It wasn't enough at the end of the day, but there you go.
"You can only beat Barcelona when you take the ball away from them, with it they are so strong."
Bayern Munich coach Pep Guardiola
"I hope the Spanish league has the rights to be screened in Germany soon, so that fans here can appreciate what a good player Lionel Messi is on a regular basis. He was a pleasure to coach when I was at Barcelona and he has demonstrated yet again what he can do."
The win over Barcelona ended Bayern's four-match losing streak since winning the German league title for the 25th time a fortnight ago. "We won four titles last season, this year we have just one, but it has been a tough season with lots of injuries and despite that, my players still attacked at every opportunity," enthused Guardiola.
Bayern's come-back win demonstrated how much they wanted to reach an 11th European Cup final, but it was too little, too late, after their emphatic first-leg defeat. "We believed in the miracle, but we couldn't make it happen," said Bayern captain Philipp Lahm.
"It's impossible to stop those Barcelona players for the whole 90 minutes. We didn't lose it today, but in the first leg."
Goal-scorer Muller was a constant threat to the Barcelona defence and made good on his pre-match promise that Bayern would fight until the final whistle.
"We played a really great game in the first half but we've made two mistakes in defence and have been too wasteful with our chances," said Muller. "That's very annoying."