We left behind two of the three best teams: Atletico coach Simeone

Spanish football club Atletico Madrid chief coach Diego Simeone has expressed his pride in having reached the final of the Champions League, after "having left behind two of the three best (teams) in the world".

Simeone made these statements after Atletico lost 1-2 against Bayern on Tuesday in Munich, but they qualified by the double value of the goals scored away from home after having won 1-0 in Madrid, reports Efe.

The Argentine coach did not specify who are the best three teams in the world. But it is understood that two of those are Bayern and Barcelona, which Atletico eliminated in the quarter-final.

Now, Atletico have reached the final of Europe's top club competition twice in the last three years.

"We have seen perhaps the best team. Just wonderful. Seeing a team with such continuity, with that intensity," he said about Tuesday's match.

He also admitted later that in first half of the match "we could not respond to what we were facing".

Simeone argued that what happened to their team, their evolution, "was not a coincidence", but the product of "how well your team works", "how they work in it" and "how much has changed" over the last years.

--IANS

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