Athletic Club - Manchester United

Athletic Club 2-Manchester United 1

Athletic Club has defeated Manchester United by 2-1, with goals by Llorente and De Marcos and the visitor goal was scored by Rooney; a match in which our team, as occurred in the first leg, has been infinitely superior to the leader of the Premier and deserved the better outcome. All of this in a vibrant encounter both inside and outside of the field, played at a neck-braking pace and that has supposed the return to quarterfinals of European competition, something that was not accomplished since 1977 in the then UEFA.

The atmosphere lived since early morning in Bilbao and many other places of the surrounding towns, had its continuation at the stadium and turned into a total celebration upon its completion. Now we must await tomorrow (Friday) morning’s draw, the Liga returns on Sunday to San Mamés with the visit of one of the possible rivals, Valencia, and with the doubtful injuries of Llorente and Herrera and definite sidelined players due to sanctions as Amorebieta and Toquero; Herrera and Ibai have passed the anti-doping controls.

In the San Mamés Presidential box, six ex-players that participated in the qualifying round of 1957 against United were present: Artetxe, Carmelo, Etura, Merodio, Mauri and Uribe. Five of them conversed this past Tuesday with several members of the first squad regarding the mentioned qualifying round, today’s match and the future of the team.

In other regards, in the UEL drawing to be held on Friday, 16 March, at 13:00h, along with Athletic Club will be Valencia, Atlético Madrid, AZ Alkmaar, Sporting of Lisbon, Metalist, Schalke and Hannover 96.