Leading 3-1 from last week’s first leg in the Arctic Circle, goals in the second half from former AC Milan forward Jens Petter Hauge and Hakon Evjen stunned the San Siro and set up a tie with either Manchester City or Sporting of Portugal in the next round.
“For us it’s been unbelievable, we knew it would be very hard against Inter who are a very strong team and played in the final last season,” said Hauge.
“I have faith in this project and we’re showing it in the Champion League.”
More than 3,000 fans travelled to Milan to watch their team continue a remarkable debut season in Europe’s elite club competition, a huge number for a club from a city with a population of around 50,000.
There were 20,000 more people at the San Siro than live in Bodo on Tuesday night and the vast majority left disappointed after Inter, who scored late through Alessandro Bastoni, failed to mount the comeback coach Cristian Chivu believed could happen.
Inter’s elimination was another blow for Italian football on the European stage, with all four Serie A clubs likely to be out of the Champions League come Thursday.
Juventus and Atalanta trail Galatasaray and Borussia Dortmund, respectively, with few giving either much of a chance of getting through ahead of their matches on Wednesday.
“The hardest thing to do today was to open the scoring and we weren’t able to do it. You can only congratulate them, they beat us twice, so they deserved to go through,” said Inter midfielder Nicolo Barella.
“Of course we’re disappointed, we want to fight on every front and we tried our best but they were better than us.” (AFP)
Edited by Cecil Wong
