Ancelotti hails best-ever Milan after win over United

MILAN, May 3 (Reuters) AC Milan coach Carlo Ancelotti said his team had given their best-ever performance after they beat Manchester United 3-0 to reach the Champions League final.

Under driving rain at the San Siro stadium yesterday, the six-times European champions outclassed United, overturning their 3-2 first leg deficit for a 5-3 aggregate victory thanks to first-half strikes by Brazilian playmaker Kaka and Dutch midfielder Clarence Seedorf, and a second-half goal by substitute Alberto Gilardino.

''The first half was the best performance since when I took charge of Milan, both from a defensive and an offensive point of view,'' said Ancelotti, who has taken the club to three Champions League finals since taking charge in November 2001.

''We knew we were capable of playing a great match and that's what happened. The way we started, though, was most important.

''It helped us come through a match that was very delicate and difficult.'' Asked to rate Milan's performance against some of the displays the great Milan side of the late Eighties and early Nineties which he was part of as a player, Ancelotti smiled and said: ''I don't know, but it's the dream of every coach to train a team like this.'' In the final in Athens on May 23, Milan will face Liverpool in a rerun of the 2005 final, which the Italian side lost on penalties in Istanbul after squandering a 3-0 halftime lead.

Ancelotti denied the past would prey on his players' minds as they prepared for the final.

''I don't think it will weigh on us at all,'' he said.

''It will certainly be a very different match from the one tonight. Liverpool are a very well-organised in defence.

''They won't leave us the space to play like Manchester United did tonight. They also have quality players in attack who can punish you.

''But we're happy to meet them in the final. It's a completely different match from the one two years ago.'' GLOOMY FERGUSON A gloomy United coach Alex Ferguson admitted his team had paid the price for a slow start, in which they went 2-0 down inside the first half hour.

''I expected more from my team. We'd done so well to get this far, but tonight we never came out of the blocks,'' he said.

''In matches like this you have to come through periods when you're under pressure, keep possession until the crowd calm down a bit.

''I think if we had coped better at the start of the game, and come through the first 25 minutes without cutting our throats it would have been OK. You can't afford to give away goals, and we gave away two soft ones tonight.

''That's not to take credit away from a fantastic performance by AC Milan, though at this level we should be doing better than that.'' His team's bid for a treble of Premier League, FA Cup and Champions League trophies had finally caught up with them, he said.

''AC Milan were better prepared physically than us. Over the last few weeks, they've been resting players at the right moments, while we've had a tough week in England.

''We've been using the same players for weeks without respite.

We also had to come the extra mile to beat Everton on Saturday.

That's what made the difference''.

REUTERS DH BST0453