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Milla salutes Spain supremacy

Spain coach Luis Milla felt a "quality" display from his side earned its reward with a 2-1 win over Portugal and a place in the semi-finals, a verdict endorsed by opposite number Ilídio Vale.

Spain's Dani Pacheco celebrates scoring against Portugal
Spain's Dani Pacheco celebrates scoring against Portugal ©Sportsfile

Spain became the first team to reach the semi-finals of this year's UEFA European Under-19 Championship after Dani Pacheco capped a fine individual performance with two goals to help La Roja see off Portugal, their second successive Group B win. Croatia and Italy played out a scoreless draw at the Stade Michel Farré and both must now win their final games to keep alive their hopes of advancing to the last four. UEFA.com hears from all four coaches.

SPAIN 2-1 PORTUGAL
Luis Milla, Spain coach
I'd first of all like congratulate my players for the way they played. I’m especially happy when I take into account the quality of the team we were up against and the fact that we responded so well to conceding a late equaliser. My players showed they were capable of lifting themselves. We did well in the first half against Croatia but today we moved the ball about even more and we were better overall. We possibly should have killed the game off sooner but we showed that we are good at stealing possession which is one of the important aspects of our game.

Ilídio Vale, Portugal coach
Spain were deserved winners over the 90 minutes; I say that because they had more possession and were stronger than us. We didn't play very well in the first half and perhaps conceded a goal we shouldn't have but after the break we had more goal chances. As the second half progressed we were more intense and we believed more, especially after we scored. Although Spain are a very good team I don't think our players deserved to lose with just two minutes left on the clock. It was a disappointment especially having got back to 1-1.

CROATIA 0-0 ITALY
Ivica Grnja, Croatia coach
I must praise my players for a good performance this afternoon. We played well, especially in the first 30 minutes when we created plenty
of chances and were unfortunate not to score. In the second half we took more risks and tried to get through to the Italian goal. Again
we were unfortunate not to make the breakthrough although perhaps we were fortunate not to concede too. If you know football you know that if you miss plenty of chances you are basically beaten in the end. I want to congratulate Italy, they fought really hard this afternoon.

Massimo Piscedda, Italy coach
It was a very tough match for us, especially after [Michelangelo] Albertazzi's red card. We had to play virtually all of the second half a man down. That made things very difficult because Croatia got the ball wide a lot making it hard for us to defend. The draw is about right but I'm happy because we kept Croatia out. They are well known to us because we've played several friendlies against them over the last few year. We knew they were very clever, very compact and break quickly in attack. After losing the first game we were probably a bit nervous when we kicked off but we improved after that.