‘We deserved better’ – Pochettino says PSG ‘dominated’ Manchester City despite Champions League semi-final defeat

Mauricio Pochettino has said Paris Saint-Germain “deserved better” than their Champions League semifinal exit on Tuesday, insisting his players did enough across two legs to advance.

Even though Manchester City finished with a 4-1 aggregate advantage after their 2-0 second leg win, the manager claimed that PSG “dominated a very difficult team to control”.

The Citizens held Pochettino’s group without a shot on target in the second leg, however, and pulled away behind a Riyad Mahrez brace with PSG eventually going down to 10 men when Angel Di Maria was dismissed in the second half.

What has been said?

“If we analyse the two games, we dominated a very difficult team to control,” Pochettino said to RMC Sport. “You need a small percentage of luck to score in key moments.

“I am disappointed, because we deserved better. But Manchester City have been more clinical than us. They scored the goals we needed, we played the game we wanted with the plan we wanted. It’s a bit disappointing obviously, because the objective was to go to the final.

“We have to be positive, it’s difficult after an elimination, you have to have this process in mind, stay calm, analyse the situation … We arrived here having beaten Barcelona and Bayern. It’s a shame not to make it to the final, but the team never gave up, they fought to the end.

“We also played 10 against 11 for [30] minutes, which is a big disadvantage. It wasn’t for us. We will go back being strong, the club and the players will be ready to win the remaining matches. We will be ready.”

Mbappe’s absence

PSG were without star forward Kylian Mbappe, who has been hampered by a calf injury, but Pochettino didn’t want to use that blow to explain the loss.

“That cannot be an excuse,” he said. “We are a team. Of course, it’s unlucky he was not ready to help the team, but that’s not an excuse. We cannot use that excuse because the performance from the team was good.”

Further reading

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