Garcia: The tie was not lost here; it was lost in the Calderon

Getafe manager, Luis Garcia lamented the fact that his side had allowed three goals in the first leg of their Copa del Rey tie with Atletico Madrid and despite the 0-0 draw on Thursday evening, they were unable to overcome such steep odds.

• By Tom Conn       Follow @TomConnISF
  

In his post-match press conference, Garcia was content with the result, but not the overall elimination at the hands of their cross-town rivals.

“We tried to start well.  They closed well.  We struggled to find our way, and after Rafa was expelled, it got even more complicated.  Whether it’s a league game and with all those minutes left, if you play to a draw against Atletico Madrid, you should be happy.  But we are not happy.  The tie was not lost here, it was lost in the Calderon, where we were thrown overboard.  The players saw that we couldn’t overcome.”

Garcia also lamented the loss of his players, most notably Angel Lafita, who could be out for a month, adding to the ever-growing list of injuries, the extent of which has Garcia wondering if he will even have enough players to field a team.

“Now we are all on the bench.  Before December we had a lot of players left out, now we’ll see if we have even have 18 for our match on Monday.  We lost Lafita and we’ll see how we recover.  We don’t have wingers and I’m worried about the game on Monday.

“We now have four of six home games.  If we are all together, we can get points.  We have to get out of this rut we’re in.  People want us to remain on top, but it’s not easy.  We’re going to try to win at Granada and change our fortunes.

“The team is in a weak stage as far as confidence and injuries.  It might be more demanding with Getafe.  We’ve had a good couple years here in Getafe.  Recently, we had the best start ever in the Copa, before we lost.  We tried to get to the final eight, but couldn’t.  But now we’ll try as hard as possible to remain as high as possible.”