Stefan Savic laughed off Marcus Thuram’s ‘strange’ decision to grab his private area during Atletico Madrid's Champions League last-16 victory over Inter, saying it was ‘not so important’. Atletico Madrid’s Champions League last-16 victory over Inter Milan, insisting it was ‘not so important’.
Trailing 1-0 from the first leg, Atleti were up against it after Federico Dimarco further increased the deficit with a cool finish past Jan Oblak in the 33rd minute at the Metropolitano Stadium on Wednesday evening.
But Antoine Griezmann immediately hit back with his sixth goal in the competition to give the hosts major hope before second-half substitute Memphis Depay struck at the death to take the tie to extra-time.
The two teams could not be separated after 120 minutes and Diego Simeone’s dogged Atleti prevailed via a dramatic penalty shootout, with Oblak denying Alexis Sanchez and Davy Klassen, and Lautaro Martinez skying his effort over the crossbar.
The La Liga giants will discover their opponents for the last eight in Friday’s Champions League quarter-final draw, where they could be paired with Arsenal, Barcelona, Bayern Munich, Borussia Dortmund, Manchester City, Paris Saint-Germain or Real Madrid.
Atleti defender Savic, certainly no stranger to the dark arts, got a taste of his own medicine in the first half of extra-time, with Inter forward Thuram squeezing the Montenegro international in the nether regions as the pair battled for position during a throw-in.
Thuram’s below-the-belt tactic went unpunished, despite Savic collapsing in a heap on the turf, but the Atleti centre-back later played down the significance of the incident in his post-match interview with TNT Sports.
‘It was a strange situation because I’m not used to it!’ Savic said.
‘But it’s okay, it can happen in the game. It’s okay. We laughed after that and I don’t know…
‘It’s a strange situation but it’s not so important.
A beaming Savic described the occasion as a ‘dream night’, with Atleti overturning a two-goal deficit to book a quarter-final spot in some style.
‘It’s amazing. It’s a dream night for us,’ he added.
If I wasn’t today on the pitch today, I would like to be in the stands to watch a game like this.
‘It was an incredible game, like a final of the Champions League. It was amazing.
‘I’m very happy that we won this game because we were in a very difficult situation. Nobody believed in us except our amazing fans and the team.
‘We knew that we needed to fight until the end, we knew it would be a long game.
‘The boss said before the game, “Prepare everybody, be ready, because it’s going to be a long night”, and it was a long night and all the guys that entered showed the same spirit, the same bravery. We are very happy for the boys.’
The has been major disparity between Atleti’s home and away form this season and Savic stressed that the squad would be doing everything in their power to put things right ahead of the quarter-finals.
'It’s a very unusual season for us on the road, I don’t know why. Maybe it’s the level of energy, maybe it’s our mindset, but I’m confident that we still have time to improve this,' he continued.
‘We are putting in a lot of effort. We are aware that we have been heavily criticized in the past few weeks, and rightly so, but we are persevering. We are working hard and we won't give up because we’re a determined team.
‘We are going to be a challenging opponent for every team in the quarter-finals, that’s for certain.’
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