France buoyant in Blois

France continued their impressive progress to the UEFA European Under-17 Championship with a 3-1 victory against holders Portugal in Blois. Trailing at half-time to Bruno Moreira's first-half strike, Samir Nasri equalised for the hosts before goals from Jérémy Menez and Hatem Ben Arfa booked their place in the final. uefa.com rounds up the reaction from some of the key participants. Click on the match result for a full report.

FRANCE 3-1 PORTUGAL:
Philippe Bergeroo, France coach
"The problem in the first half was the weight of expectation. There was a lot of pressure, there were families, the media, and that's a lot to cope with at the age of 17. But the most important thing was to reach the final, which allows us to play in the [UEFA-CAF] Meridian Cup next year. Winning gives this generation of players a great chance, to play against four African sides next year. I was a little bit harsh at half-time because I think this is a group of players who need to be challenged, and I said simply that playing the way we did in the first half, we didn't deserve to be in the final. It was a different side in the second half, the talent was always there but we played more as a team. Our long-term objective for these players is to prepare them for the France Under-21 side in three years, so we have to try to correct their faults and keep their creativity."

Carlos Dinis, Portugal coach
"We are obviously not satisfied to have lost. After the first goal we lost our way and our shape, which made it much harder for us. We controlled the first half, which culminated in our goal. In the second half, however, we left more space for France to exploit, we were not as compact and there was less coordination between the defence and midfield. Against players as quick as the French attackers, that caused us real problems. As a whole, we would have done better had our players been in better shape, but France showed better quality than us today and deserved to qualify for the final."

Steven Thicot, France captain
"We are very happy now – at the start of the tournament our first aim was to qualify from the group and the second was to reach the final. But we can't stop now, we have to go on and win the cup because we are not sure if we'll get the chance to play together like this again. The first half was very hard, the pressure got to us a little and at half-time the coach reminded us that we have worked for this for two years and we had to give our all in the second half if we didn't want to be knocked out. Fortunately, we managed to turn the game round and started to play again in the second half against a good Portugal team who we know very well. We are confident going into the final but we have not won the cup yet; there are still 80 minutes to go and we have to give our all to make sure France win."

Hatem Ben Arfa
We have really achieved something, although in the first half we were under pressure. At half-time the coach reminded us that it was a semi-final and we had to raise our game in the second half if we wanted to get to the final. We never doubted in the first half as we are quality players, but perhaps we were a little afraid."