The German side dominated the Champions League semi-final second leg at the Allianz Arena to win 2-1 but Atleti progressed to the final by virtue of the away goals rule after a 2-2 aggregate.
Advertisement
Antoine Griezmann scored the vital away goal that saw Atletico Madrid advance to the final of the Champions League.
Antoine Griezmann fired in an equaliser on the break after-half-time, and although Robert Lewandowski’s header set up a tense finish, Atletico held on, despite Fernando Torres missing a penalty.
“Sometimes when you play a super team like Bayern you can’t play the game you want and in the first half we couldn’t find the way to press them high, to stop the transitions, they play so quick and in the end we took a step back”. We tried our best to score that night but we didn’t get through.
“We must keep our feet on the ground, focus on La Liga now”, Griezmann said.
Atletico would now face the victor of the tie between Real Madrid and Manchester City at the Santiago Bernabeu on Wednesday with a repeat of the final two years ago very much a possibility.
‘Today ugly football – Atletico – played against the best football in the world. Their first leg match finished 0-0 last week in Manchester, with the return match in Madrid on Wednesday.
Bayern needed one more goal to avoid going out at the semifinal stage for the third straight season to a Spanish team and poured everything forward – only to be denied by Oblak and his defenders. “We’ve knocked them out, and I’m very proud of that”.
“Their first half was fantastic, with us providing a minimal response to the situations they created”.
“They could push us back and had a lot of chances in the first half”.
The Bavarians went ahead with a Xabi Alonso free kick just past the half-hour and could have scored again three minutes later but Thomas Mueller’s penalty was saved by Jan Oblak.
Bayern pushed for a second goal and thought they would have it when Javi Martinez was brought down by Gimenez in the box to earn a penalty three minutes later.
Advertisement
Torres also spoke on Spanish TV after the game and admitted he and his team had “suffered” to get the result they wanted. It was my ambition to win the Champions League here.
