Coaches reflect on high drama

The most unpredictable of pools lived up to its billing as last season's winners France and runners-up Norway were both eliminated from the UEFA European Women's Under-19 Championship on Monday.

High drama
Italy finished atop Group A despite a sensational loss to France, who scored twice in added time in Hyninkää. In a match played simultaneously in Loviisa, Russia defeated Norway 3-0 to progress to a semi-final against Germany, squeezing ahead of France by virtue of goals scored. Italy's reward is a showdown with Spain. uefa.com gauges the reaction from a day of a high drama.

France 3-2 Italy

Bruno Bini, France
It's very hard to lose like that, especially for the girls who thought they had done enough. For adults it is a lot easier to accept how things like this work. Whatever I say cannot console them. However, I'm very proud to be the coach of this team. To be eliminated because [Russia] have scored one more goal is very despairing. We played well and hit the post or crossbar on three occasions; the Italians played defensively, only scoring their first goal after a mistake by our defence. We knew that if we scored one goal they would panic and that's what happened. We've had problems scoring in this tournament, if we'd have scored first it could have been different. The beautiful game is not the one which has triumphed here.

Elisabetta Bavagnoli, Italy
We were aware that we were playing a good passing team who would have the majority of possession so we tried to defend and play on the counterattack. I think a draw would have been a fair result in the end, although I'm very angry that we threw away a two-goal lead - three goals in seven minutes was not acceptable from our point of view. For most of the match I was satisfied as the players were in control on the pitch and until the end I could not have asked any more from them. Then they became scared and played negatively. I don't know whether to be more concerned by the fact we lost in the final minute or the manner in which we qualified, as from a sporting perspective it was hard on France.

Russia 3-0 Norway

Valentin Grishin, Russia
I can understand what Norway are going through because it was the same for us after losing 5-1 to Italy, when we couldn't get into the game. After that match I said it was important to score the first goal - and after scoring after 16 seconds the players were obviously very motivated and we knew we could score again. I hope we can play Norway again in the future. We will do our best from now on and it is very important to have won through to the semi-finals.

Jarl Tørske, Norway
Congratulations to Russia - they take the credit and we played a poor game. We had a lot of chances but we could not manage to score. It is disappointing to miss out on the semi-finals. The early goal shocked the team but we still got back into he game. But in the end Russia were more efficient than us and we were too passive and slow in defence. The only thing you can do in this situation is console the players. It is a disappointment to go no further despite a good start. Good luck to Russia in Thailand.