Zidane hails gritty Real Madrid
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but now that we are what we have to do is try to win. we will fight to defend our title1 coach zinedine zidane said he would not have wanted it any other way after real madrid scraped their way into a third consecutive champions league final on tuesday1 when joshua kimmich gave bayern an early lead and james rodriguez levelled with 27 minutes remaining real looked in danger of surrendering their 2-1 advantage from the first leg1 by the end reals fans were begging for the full-time whistle and if it is to be liverpool in the final in kiev jurgen klopps men will take heart1 zidane however insists the grit his team have shown to overcome paris saint-germain juve and now bayern should not be underestimated1 in football you have to suffer zidane said. you cannot be in the final without suffering its even better more beautiful when you win like that1 madrid never gives up. it is the same in adversity we believe in what we do and we get things done by believing in ourselves and fighting1 real and zidane are now on the brink of a third consecutive champions league triumph and 13th overall in europes premier tournament1 whether it be liverpool or roma they face in kiev los blancos will be strong favourites to lift the title1 we are only in the final zidane said. you can be happy you have to be it is not normal to be in the final for the third consecutive time1 after their last-gasp win over juventus in the quarter-finals real were left hanging on against bayern munich at the santiago bernabeu as karim benzemas double secured a 2-2 draw and 4-3 win on aggregate1 spectacular navas1 benzemas two goals were also credit to zidane who had picked the striker despite a poor run of form that had included only one goal in 12 games1 he never gave up and im happy for him zidane said. i defended karim as i defend all my players i defend them until the end1 bayern meanwhile are left wondering what might have been after dominating large spells of the two legs but paying a heavy price for individual mistakes1 benzemas second which proved decisive was a gift with goalkeeper sven ulreich making a mess of corentin tolissos under-hit back pass and allowing the frenchman to slot into an open net1 if you look at both games it is quite apparent we were the best team bayern coach jupp heynckes said1 im very disappointed in the result. we dominated i believe and they should thank keylor navas for his performance in goal he was spectacular particularly towards the end of the match1 on ulreichs error heynckes added he had a little blackout he got confused he didnt realise he couldnt pick it up with his hands1 its terrible for a player to live through such a moment but nevertheless we did have a lot of opportunities and all in all our keeper performed well1