Even though he was left frustrated by a couple of technical lapses, the Aiglons boss appreciated his side’s spirit against Ajax.

Coach, how do you analyse that match?
I think that the equaliser hurt us. Then, we didn’t remain as disciplined as we were in the first-half. We left it too open, too many spaces and then we saw the way that they win back the ball and create dangerous opportunities. On the whole, it wasn’t bad the way we played tonight against a very good team. Physically, to face them, it is tough, we saw that when we let them come at us in the second period, that was very dangerous.

Are you satisfied with the way the game currently looks?
We drew 1-1. Unfortunately, we waited until the last 20 minutes to find our attacking style again. We could almost have got it to 2-1. We were better at the break-down but we were missing that pass, to get down the wings. Our first period was good, we played it well. We scored, we could even have scored a second. On the whole, I am quite happy.

How do you explain the difficulties you faced in the second-half?
We conceded very quickly. In the first-half, we defended very compactly, they couldn’t find any space. It’s a shame to concede a goal in that way. At the end of the day, they hadn’t really had any chances before that. What’s annoying for me is that we didn’t cut through them enough when we had the ball, they could have been put in more danger.

Something that Dalbert did as he came on?
Yes, but that’s something that is more specific on his wing. Sometimes, it’s just a question of your control, that you lose the time which allows the opponent to get back in place. We were missing that something with our first touch.

Do you think you have more chances of qualifying now than you did before kick-off?
Everything is possible. We will need to score at least one at their place. From now until then, we will analyse this match, we have a week to prepare for it. We didn’t let them play, that’s what we wanted. But they were very agressive when we had the ball, it’s our speed at those times that we need to work on, to put them in more dangerous situations.

What was the reason behind taking Mario Balotelli off?
It’s mainly physical, even at the break, he was starting to feel some cramp.

At the end of the evening, what do you take away from this evening?
We had very good spirit, we put a lot of energy into the game, lots of players went to their physical limits. We played our football, we need to do that more, to cause more problems. We are disappointed by the goal that came from nothing at the start of the second period. But that is football…

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