UEFA Champions League 2008-2009: Manchester United vs Porto

The Manchester United FC manager recalled his team's 3-2 win at Juventus in the 1999 UEFA Champions League semi-finals – the last time they fought their way out of a similarly tight spot – as he reflected on the advantage Porto gained from the 2-2 first-leg draw at Old Trafford. Sir Alex said "We were disappointed in losing the last-minute goal [by Mariano] in the last game. That has given a definite edge to Porto but we are capable of turning that around. It is not as if we are going here without a big chance. We have to remember the places we have been in the past, like Juventus, when we drew at home and won away."
The feeling is very unpleasant and with a flavour of injustice for all we did in these two games against Manchester United. We started the match with the same players and we approached the game as we always do. I think everybody at the club can feel proud of what we did, knowing that this was not what we wanted from the tie. We wanted more and we deserved to qualify for the last four. However, we are talking about facing the best team in the world, the European champions. The scorer of their goal is quite simply the best player in the world. It's very hard to find any team capable of playing like we did at Old Trafford, including English teams. Ernesto Farías allowed us to have more presence in United's area and that worked well but in the end we didn't manage to score.



United's Portuguese forward may have had a mixed season but his world-class talent has never been in doubt and he underlined it here with the 35-metre strike that secured a 3-2 aggregate victory for Sir Alex Ferguson's side who – in the process – became the first English team to win at Porto. History has never been an impediment to Sir Alex Ferguson, who has rewritten the record books in over two decades at Old Trafford, and his quintuple-chasing team can now look forward to a semi-final against Arsenal FC with renewed heart having rediscovered their defensive solidity here with a first clean sheet in six matches.
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