Soccer:Chelsea left back Ashley Cole hailed his team's self-belief after the 10-man Blues drew 2-2 with holders Barcelona at the Nou Camp to progress to the Champions League final.
Roberto Di Matteo’s side fought back from 2-0 down after having captain John Terry sent off for inexplicably kneeing Alexis Sanchez from behind, with goals from Ramires and Fernando Torres completing a remarkable 3-2 aggregate win.
The visitors were further disrupted by the loss of Gary Cahill through injury.
Cole said: “When you lose quality centre halves like that against a great team, it’s going to be hard. But we all believed. Not many people did but we did as a group of players, and that’s what happened.
“It’s hard, but we defended well as a team, got a bit lucky, and Petr (Cech) made some good saves.
“Three to four months ago no one thought we had a chance. We lost a few games in the Premier League but we always believed and knew we were good enough to be here. You can’t beat that desire and fight that you saw out there today.”
Defender Branislav Ivanovic, who will miss next month’s final in Munich after a late yellow card, added: “It was a very difficult game. We deserved to qualify.”
Midfielder Frank Lampard savoured the result as one of the most special of his 11 years with the west London club.
“It’s one of the finest moments I’ve felt in a Chelsea shirt,” he said. “It was backs to the wall. I know we dug in and people want to see beautiful football, but with 10 men for 50-odd minutes or whatever it was, to perform like that was unbelievable.
“That clock wasn’t half slow in the second half! You know they’re liable at any moment because of the players they’ve got in their team but there’s a determination about us and you get what you deserve. We were all in it together and we dug in.”
Asked at what point he thought the job was done, Lampard replied: “When Fernando went round the keeper!”
Looking ahead to the May 19 final against Jose Mourinho’s Real Madrid or Bayern Munich who meet in their semi-final second leg tomorrow night at the Bernabeu, the England international said: “I don’t even want to think about that yet. They’re two very, very good teams. It could go either way.
“Of course Chelsea people have a lot of love and respect for Jose for what he’s done here. But we’re just delighted. No-one expected us to go through and we’re in that final.”
