Pellegrini’s statements:

(MCF-Real Madrid). “It hurts losing a clash in this way.  There were two unfortunate incidents and two errors against a great time like Madrid.  But I’m very happy with what the team did.  We’re trying to instil a mentality of a great team, and today's was a very even match, I’m very comfortable with the performance.  They were two very balanced matches, but you can’t give away goals in both matches to the likes of Madrid. Willy has given us many satisfactions, but unfortunately, today was the day he made a mistake, but we’re satisfied with how the team played.  We needed to score a decisive goal when it was still 0-0, but you have to gamble on the result in such games.”

(Near future).  “We’re moving on with the intention of going as far up the table as possible.  It’s been a while since won a game and in the last few matches, we’ve not converted goals.  We have to improve a number of things in the areas where we have weaknesses.”

(Apoño).  “Apoño, or any other player in the squad, wants to play more.  We look at the situation and if the player is still here there’s no problem from a personal point of view; any player knows that I’ll be asking him to step up.”

(More goals).  “We need to create more chances to go along with the command that we have, and we have to convert more of those chances that we do have.  We’ve been drawn against some great teams, and we got two goals against Madrid for instance, so we’ve got to maintain the positive aspects and improve on the negative ones.  We’re coming from the Christmas break but I don’t think there are any physical problems.”