Southampton manager, Tonda Eckert praised his players for giving “absolutely everything” in their FA Cup semi-final defeat to Manchester City.
50 years on from their sole FA Cup title, Finn Azaz put Eckert’s Saints on the cusp of another final but Jeremy Doku’s deflected strike off James Bree and Nico Gonzalez’s strike saw City snatch a late comeback.
“The performance was excellent today,” reflected Eckert post match to southamptonfc.com as he praised his players for their battling spirit and forced City to score their goals from the edge of the box,
“These teams make you suffer in moments of the game, whether you want to or not, they’re going to push you down to defend a little bit deeper in some moments of the game.
“I think we’ve done this brilliantly over big, big spells, and you know that down the other end you are always going to get some moments.
“We had a big one in the first half that was a very small, close decision and we had the one in the second half. I think it speaks for us that it’s two goals from distance that we’ve conceded today, but it is what it is.”
Eckert proceeded to applaud Pep Guardiola’s Cityzens for their quality and felt that his team gave their absolute best to make City work for their comeback win.
“You have to give credit to City and the way they keep pushing in those moments of the game. They’re a team full of champions and you see this towards the end – it just becomes harder and harder.
“I think we’ve done absolutely everything we could today. I think everyone who was in the stadium saw that we left everything out on the pitch, and then it lives off small moments – these games are decided by small moments.
“Unfortunately they were not on our side towards the very end, but the performance was outstanding, the away support was outstanding, and we are going to need exactly the same for the last games of the season.”
Eckert acknowledged the support from the crowd which formed a sea of yellow but vowed that their priority is now on their crucial Championship clash at home to Ipswich on Tuesday 28 April, where a win would result in a four-way shootout on the final day for the last automatic promotion spot.
“It was just so nice coming into the stadium, looking towards the right and having the whole stadium in yellow. Big, big credit and thank you to the supporters, but we put the game to bed now quickly, and we’ll go again on Tuesday.”
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