Real coach salutes Barca, but confident about future
(Agencies)
Updated: 2005-05-16 18:32

Real Madrid coach VanderleiLuxemburgo has hailed Barcelona as worthy champions but believeshis side could have beaten them to the league title if he hadhad more time at the helm.

"They deserved to win it," the Brazilian told sports dailyMarca on Monday.

"There has been a lot of talk here about whether they havebeen given the benefit of refereeing decisions and other things,but they've been a great team and have been on top formthroughout the season.

"We put them under a lot of pressure, but they never easedup and although we amassed a lot of points they have deservedtheir victory."

Barcelona clinched their first league title in six years onSaturday after they drew 1-1 at Levante, while Real were held2-2 at Sevilla. The results gave them an unassailable six-pointlead at the top of the table with two games left to play.

Even if the Catalans lose their remaining two matches theycannot be caught because of their better head-to-head record inmeetings between the two teams this season.

Luxemburgo took over at Real at the end of last year withthe club in the midst of a crisis that had seen them slump tofifth place in the league, 13 points behind Barcelona.

A 1-0 defeat at home to Sevilla prompted the club to sackprevious boss Mariano Garcia Remon who had taken charge of theteam after Jose Antonio Camacho had thrown in the towel justthree games into the season.

Luxemburgo, who had recently led Santos to the Braziliantitle, helped spark an immediate upturn in Real's fortunes bymasterminding their 2-1 win over Real Sociedad in the remainingsix minutes of a match that had been held over because of a bombscare at the Bernabeu.

In the 19 games since that victory Real have made up afurther four points on Barcelona and Luxemburgo believes that ifhe had had a little more time in charge of the side they couldhave deprived their arch-rivals of the title.

"I'm very happy with the way the team has responded since Itook over," he said. "But at the same time I'm sad because Ididn't have time to win the league... Now I hope to be able tobe in charge for a complete campaign and not just half a season.

"This is a very big club and I have no doubt that we canturn this team into the champions and we are going to do it --I'm sure of it."