Stefano Pioli was pleased with Milan’s 1-0 win over Napoli but insists that the tie is still 50-50 with everything to play for. The two sides met in the first leg of the Champions League quarter-finals with Ismael Bennacer breaking the deadlock in the first half with a wonderfully crafted team goal. Napoli made a contest of it in the second half but the game ended 1-0 with the second-leg scheduled for next week in Naples. Speaking with Sky Italia (as quoted by MilanNews) after the match, Pioli expressed his satisfaction with the performance overall, but like Luciano Spalletti, he insisted that the tie is still 50-50 for the moment and explained why he thinks their mental approach to the match helped changed things:
“We are happy to experience evenings like this with the fans. Milan has won so much in the Champions League. In these three years we have dreamed of reaching certain levels. We played a fair game, at the beginning we couldn’t build from the back. We finally beat Napoli at home. However, this was only the first half, qualification is still far away.”
“We always have our game plan, then the opponents can play differently. The moments of the match then are decisive. The mental aspect changes everything. We must always play focused because they can strike at any time.”
“1-0 is a good result, but before the game I thought we had a 50-50 chance, I think it’s still like that.”
“The final? It’s nice to dream at night, but it’s more important to work during the day to fulfill your dreams. In these years we have all worked well, thinking about one step at a time. Now we think about the championship, then we will think about the return leg.”
“We had some luck at the beginning, but we never lost our balance. We sacrificed, we conceded something. In numerical superiority we lacked a bit of lucidity, too bad we didn’t score the second goal, but it’s a positive result that allows us to go to Naples to play our chances.”
“Krunic is doing a great job in both phases. They closed spaces for us well. We tried to do what we had prepared.”
