After watching his Manchester City team pull out a 1-1 draw away to Champions League holders Real Madrid in the first leg of their competition semi-final on Tuesday, Pep Guardiola was clearly exhausted and said that his team needed to "defend better and attack better."
Midway through the second half, Kevin De Bruyne scored a devastating goal of his own to offset Vinicius Junior's magnificent opening strike. Although City had the advantage at the outset, Eduardo Camavinga broke through the visitors' press and provided the assist for Vinicius' goal.
After playing sparingly for the first 45 minutes, Madrid was more aggressive after the interval, stroking the ball all over the place, only for De Bruyne to pierce the superiority of the hosts. On May 17, both teams will reassemble for the second leg at the Etihad.
When speaking to BT Sport, Guardiola summarized the game thusly: "When we were better they scored, when they were better we scored."
The exhausted Catalan coach remarked, "The Bernabeu semifinal is always challenging. It was a close, tight game. Although we had some positive moments, the way they handled the ball at times made it challenging. However, with a score of 1–1, our team will play in the championship on Wednesday.
Guardiola insisted, "We start really well in the second half as well. After they won the game, we were unable to handle it after five or ten minutes. They are really, really good there. They make a lot of passes. They put a lot of players on the left side. But after we scored thanks to a wonderful goal from Kevin, we enjoyed ourselves. Finally, they also have a few opportunities. It was a really close game.
Although Carlo Ancelotti's team has found it difficult to keep up with Barcelona in the La Liga race, they are still a force to be reckoned with in the league, which Real Madrid has won a record 14 times. Guardiola exclaimed, "It is very demanding.
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