Renee Slegers reacts to Arsenal winning the Champions League

Renee Slegers met the press after Arsenal’s incredible Champions League win this evening. Here’s what she had to say.

Read the match report here.

Tim Stillman, Arseblog News. Rene, I usually ask you a kind of pretentious tactical question after a game, but I’m not emotionally together enough to do that right now. So I’m just going to ask, you know, obviously you had a very solid game plan, but the players have to go out and execute it under a lot of pressure on a very hot day. Just how proud are you of the players for doing that today?

Yeah, so it’s exactly what you say. Of course, super proud because you can have all these ideas in your head and show video and animations and use your tactics board and all those things and do it in training, but then when the moment is actually there and you’re going to play against an opponent that is so good, that has been so good for so long, that we haven’t played against for many years. Yeah, so to then execute this in a Champions League final.

It says so much about the players because it’s not an easy game to play. It’s probably the hardest game we’ve played so far and with all the quality that Barcelona has, with all their rotations and all their individual threats, there was so much to deal with today and the players had to make decisions every single second on the pitch and every step was going to make a difference and every decision was going to make a difference.

And we knew that momentum would shift. We believed that momentum was going to be on our side at times, but we also were very aware and realistic about their qualities and that we had to suffer at times in games, but I think the way we managed the game, for me it’s unbelievable. It’s above all expectation because I think we’re almost spot on with what the players deliver on the pitch in a crucial moment.

Congratulations Renee, an incredible achievement. I’d imagine this is hard for you to think back, but when you were assistant at the start of the season and looking ahead to where you would be in nine months’ time, I’d imagine you didn’t think you would be leading the team out to win a Champions League. How do you reflect on just that unbelievably crazy journey that you as an individual have gone on over the last nine months? It’s been a fantastic time.

There’s so many things that have happened this season and there’s so many hard times we’ve gone through together as a team and we’ve always fought back. I think as a team the belief was growing every single day in the season and I think there’s a couple of crucial moments in the season for us that gave us the evidence of what we were capable of.

But everyone who’s been in the building every single day has seen that it has been growing every day because of the investment and the effort that the players have been putting in because there’s been so much engagement, so much investment, so much belief and intensity in the way we train. I’m so happy for everyone that everything we’ve been asking for and all the demands we’ve had and all the questions we’ve asked on the players, that they got the reward today.

I think they’re so worth it because they’ve worked extremely hard and the positive thing about everything, of course we’re going to reflect and take all this in, but I think there’s even more in this team, so that’s always the scary part of it, that we’ve achieved something enormous today, but there’s even more to give in this team. So we’re really going to celebrate tonight and enjoy the moment and then there’s some time off and there’s Euros and other national team camps and then we go back and I’m so excited about more with this team.

Hi Rene, when you look at what Arsenal have built off the pitch in this fan culture, seeing them all today in Lisbon, the sold out stadiums over the last few years, how much does it mean to you to now give them this on the pitch and how much are you looking forward to celebrating with them on Monday as well?

So much, because I was at the club in 2007, so I have a little bit of an idea of where the club comes from and I had lunch with Vic Akers this week and it was fantastic to see him and bring a perspective and I think that so many people have been investing for such a long time. So I’m just a very small part of it and so many people have done much more across more time and had to be resilient in the background, wanting to push it forward and thank you so much to all those people and I’m happy because if you achieve something by yourself, that’s great, but if you achieve something together, that’s much greater and together with the fans. They couldn’t stop going now after the game and it’s such a special moment to share this with so many people.

Hi Rene, Kit Sheppard from the Times. You touched on the future a little bit there, once you’ve done what you’re celebrating. How do you use this victory and this title, I guess as a springboard into the coming seasons to maybe win a WSL title or win a Champions League again? What can this victory do for the club in the long term?

It means so much, like I just said, for everyone who’s built towards this across many years, but it also means so much for the future because it motivates people, it motivates us and again, I think it shows what we’re capable of and like I just said, there’s even more in the group. But I think the strength of this team has been to be in the present, be in the here and now and try to go and become better every single day but of course, if you’re part of Arsenal, then you go for trophies and that’s what the club wants and that’s what we want as well.

I just wanted to ask what you think the impact of this victory will have overall on the game. Obviously, you’re a club that’s invested both on and off the pitch really trying to do things the right way and lift everyone else up with you. Now looking at the fact that there’s a new name on this trophy after two clubs have kind of shared it back and forth, it feels really important that you have done it in the way that you have done it and how you think that you might also have ended up with you as a result of this.

Yeah, I agree and the game is growing so fast and I think this is great that there’s more and more teams and clubs and countries building and growing the game and investing and that’s good. It gets more and more competitive which is very good for the development of the game. Of course, I’m happy that it’s us but it’s good that it’s more and more teams competing.

Tom Garry from The Guardian. Congratulations. You mentioned Vic, his assistant back in 2007 was Emma Hayes and I’m just very curious whether maybe you had any conversation with her in the last few weeks or months about Barcelona, someone she’s played so many times. If you did, what was that like? 

Yeah, so Emma Hayes was the assistant coach to Vic for the first team but I was in the academy so she was my head coach. Kelly Smith, assistant coach, it’s special to have spent that year with those icons and almost you could say legends. I really look up to them and I know what they’ve done for the club. Emma, I spoke to her during the week. There’s always a lot of contact with national team coaches, with colleagues.

Yes, I did speak to her this week and it was a great conversation and we did speak about Barcelona as well. I’ve spoken to other coaches as well and got their experiences of playing against Barcelona. I coached against Barcelona a couple of years ago in the Champions League as well.

All these experiences and advices, you take them but at the end of the day it’s this team and this moment that is facing Barcelona. I think what’s been so great because you think about adjusting things against Barcelona because they’re so incredibly good at what they do and I think we found the right adjustments. We were so close and so much ourselves today which I think has been such a key factor of us being able to play our game and stopping now from playing the best team.

Hi, good evening. Diogo Reis speaking on the internet. First of all, I wanted to congratulate you on your win in the Champions League. My question is, strategically speaking, what were the weaknesses that we were trying to find in Barcelona and what was the strategic key to winning this match and the competition in general? Thank you.

Thank you. There’s not a lot of weaknesses in Barcelona as a team. They’re on a very high level but every team has weaknesses. We looked at how we could exploit it the best way possible but I think what we did so well was managing the game and using all possible tools to get the rhythm up, speed the game up and disrupt but stay close to who we are, what we want to do and I think the game management, that was key for us today and that was key to why we won today.

Marta Guiñan from AS. I’m going to try in English. Congratulations. Congratulations. Today you played against Aitana, Alexia and Patri, for many people the best players in the world. So what was the plan to stop them? Especially for Kim Little and Frida Maanum.

Yeah, we said beforehand they’re the engine of our team so they are in the middle of their team and they are the conductors, the engine, so we wanted to stop them and it’s not only the three of them. If you look at it from a structural perspective they also create a four player side and they want to create overloads everywhere and they rotate so it’s a real big challenge to stop them because of their intelligence and quality and their ability to find spaces on the pitch. What we did, we tried to stop that with our midfield and with help of other players when they came in with more players in the central areas.

Yeah, so that was basically the plan and we had a good look at them individually what their strengths were, what did they do what moments on the pitch, what moments in the game what are their typical actions and I think the players got so much information beforehand before the game and they applied it and transferred it so well to the pitch so it’s such an incredible performance by the players today.

Thank you very much.

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