"The team had an extraordinary response"

POST-MATCH

In José Mourinho's analysis, Benfica achieved a “well-deserved” victory against Nacional (1-2) on matchday 12 of the Liga Betclic, played on Saturday, November 29, at the Estádio da Madeira.

A WELL-DESERVED TRIUMPH SEALED LATE ON

"It shouldn't have gone to the end, it should have been settled in the first half. The team played very well, started the game very well, dominated with the ball, dominated without the ball, didn't allow Nacional to create any dangerous situations. We always played in the opponent's midfield, the team was very organized when we lost the ball, very organized in recovering and not allowing Nacional any kind of counterattack. I think we should have been winning in the first half. In the second half, we started as well as in the first, in my opinion. It's difficult to talk about the referee, but there was a penalty on Barreiro in the 50th minute. During the game, I didn't notice it, I had my doubts, but after seeing it at the end of the game, it was a clear penalty on Barreiro, but we let it go. And then, completely against the run of play—it was our mistake, the only mistake we made in defense—Nacional scored. At that point, we were on the brink of disaster, and the team responded extraordinarily well. They kept their cool, but started to accelerate, to intensify. Then, they started to catch up with a team that was already tired, and our players who came on—the three who came on: Prestianni, Ivanovic, and Schjelderup—came on well and changed the pace of the game. Then there's that thing... when you win in the last few minutes, there's always that drama, but I think Benfica's performance overall was very good. We had a very good second half in Guimarães, but here we played well for the full 90 minutes. It's obviously a difficult victory, but it's a very, very, very well-deserved victory."

A MATTER OF PROFILES

"Look, I... I think you know me a little bit [addressing the journalist] from these press conferences. Perhaps, despite being young, you've also been following my career, so I think you know my profile more or less. I don't talk nonsense, I don't make up stories. Today, if we had lost this game, I would have congratulated my players. The only thing they didn't do, if we had lost 1-0, was score a goal. They did everything right, on a difficult pitch, against a difficult opponent with a style of play that I won't comment on—because I have nothing to say about how my opponents play—losing 1-0 completely against the run of play, which is a hard blow. The team was... I took a risk, but they accepted it. Sudakov starts on the left, then moves to the number 10 position, and then, in the last 15 minutes, when Schjelderup comes on, he moves to the number 8 position. Just to give an example of the level of commitment of the players. Today, if I lose the game, it would obviously be a big frustration. I don't even want to imagine what all those who comment on football in Portugal would say if we lost the game, but for me, what matters is what I see, what I feel, and what I saw and felt was a good team playing well, with its limitations, because we have limitations. When we play against a team with an ultra-low block, with big players, with good defenders in the box, sometimes we lack a reference point with a different profile from what we have, but we went looking for solutions. We spread out, we brought people in from behind, we brought in technical players who could find small spaces within a super-tight defense, and the players deserved it. That's why I celebrated so much, because I wanted to give them that recognition immediately, because the victory is theirs. We coaches sometimes make substitutions that work or don't work, but it's the players who decide whether they work or not, and they're the ones who accept the risk or not. This idea of fearful coaches or coaches who take big risks is all theory, because, in practice, it is they who have to accept both one style of play and another, and, just as the Nacional players fought to the end for their style of play, we stuck with our style until the end, and, in my opinion, we deserved to win."

TAKING RISKS AND THE POINTS THAT FUEL THEM

"[Is the players' attitude closer to what José Mourinho wants?] It's not José Mourinho, it's Benfica. Whether they play better or worse, have more talent or less talent, have more players available or fewer players available, Benfica has to go all the way. Benfica has to go all the way. If Benfica loses today's game, it will be a tremendous injustice, but regardless of any negative reaction from members, fans, and obviously the press—it would be another Lisbon earthquake—they were Benfica. And also for them to take the risk, to have the courage not to have the problem of ‘OK, if we lose 2-0, we lose 2-0, but 1-0 and demoralized and passive, no’. The team took that risk very well. I'm very happy, obviously with the victory, because it's the points that we feed on, but I'm also very happy with the way the team played. I'm happy, I think the players deserved this too. And Ajax, away from home, and traveling only the next day, and having one day to train and little else, and traveling again to Madeira, and having a difficult game like this, on a pitch that is difficult for everyone, in a game that became even more difficult because we didn't score... because there is also something that seemed, or could seem, like the negativity that has accompanied Benfica. Before Nacional's goal, Barreiro missed an open goal. And Nacional, who didn't have a single shot on goal, went and scored. Normally, in the Benfica I came to know, that would have been the final nail in the coffin. But for them, it wasn't. Barreiro misses the goal, we make a mistake there, Nacional scores, there are 20 minutes left, which we knew wouldn't be 20, we knew it would be 7 or 8, because the way the game was being managed, that's what was going to happen. But they kept going, and going, and going. And when we scored the equalizer, I thought the second goal would come, because the momentum was already strong."