Niko Kovac: “We deserved to be knocked out.” | OneFootball

Niko Kovac (on DAZN): “When you concede four goals in the Champions League, as we have already done in the league phase, it's difficult. We don't need to talk about the penalty now. We just weren't really there in the moments when we conceded the goals. In the Champions League, mistakes like that are punished, so we are very disappointed and quite downhearted. After playing really well at home, we can't let a tie like this slip away here, even if we knew it was going to be tough. We're a Bundesliga team and we have to be able to handle that. We deserved to be knocked out. We didn't perform well enough to progress.”

Sebastian Kehl (in the mixed zone): “It was a very poor performance from us in many phases throughout the game. We deserved to fall behind, we recovered in certain phases, but conceding four goals here is simply too much. That shouldn't happen to us at this level, and that's why we deserved to be eliminated.”

Emre Can (on DAZN): “I'm not blaming any player, but when you make so many individual mistakes, it's difficult to progress. And if we had taken our chances – and I believe we had a few clear-cut opportunities in the second half – then it would have been very, very unfortunate in the end. But to be honest, we deserved to be knocked out. It hurts a lot. How many times has Gregor helped and saved us this season? The way he pulled off another great save in the first half was incredible. I feel sorry for him! As I said, no blame, no blame at all. We're all in it together.”

Gregor Kobel (on DAZN): “That was my mistake, and I'm obviously really sorry for the lads because I think we had a good comeback. We were actually back in the game, and then it ended like that. Of course, I wanted to clear the ball first and I had to make a split-second decision. I tried to find another solution, but, as I said, I just have to clear it somehow. Now it's time to dust ourselves off, move on and be there for the team so that we can all quickly regroup and be ready for the weekend. What's done is done.”Recorded by Boris Rupert