Werder were on their game from the first minute on, hardly allowing Milan out of their own half. But still the hosts bagged two goals to lead 2-0. Bremen's world seemed to be continuing its distorted turn from the past few weeks. But then everything changed. The team became stronger in the midfield with Diego, Torsten Frings and Mesut Özil. And then two trumps decided the game: Thomas Schaaf and Claudio Pizarro.

"We were the dominating team but things didn't start all that well," said keeper Christian Vander of the first half. "Then we got into the locker room and the coach found the right words. After that we got our butts moving." When asked what Schaaf said, Vander offered: "He demanded that we have more trust in one another, concentrate more on our scoring chances, push more into the area instead of shooting from long distance and send more crosses into the box. And that was the right concept. We gave everything we had until the final minute and redeemed ourselves with the 2-2 draw. We absolutely deserved to move on."

Even though Vander did not want to single out any one player, he couldn't help praising the two-goal scorer Claudio Pizarro. "He crowned his fantastic showing with both goals." Werder's top striker proved once again in Stadio Giuseppe Meazza how important he is for the team while putting behind him being taken off the player list for the Cottbus game for tardiness. "That is forgotten. I made a mistake and accepted the consequences. Today I showed that I am there for the team and used my experience. I was able to help us to advance to the next round. Today we played one of our best games since I have been back at Werder."

The team's belief in their own strengths against AC Milan turned out to be the difference for the Green-Whites. That was manager Klaus Allofs's opinion: "The team believed in themselves even trailing 2-0. They just kept going, knowing that just one goal would make the opponents nervous. And that's what happened."