Life’s tough on the bench, but Amor delighted with his Reds’ work in A-league grand final

ADELAIDE United coach Guillermo Amor says coaching the Reds to an historic A-League grand final felt different than winning trophies for Barcelona. But he’s loving it.

Adelaide United coach Guillermo Amor celebrates with Craig Goodwin after the Reds won the A-League grand final. Picture: Morne de Klerk (Getty Images)

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ADELAIDE United coach Guillermo Amor says coaching the Reds to an historic A-League grand final felt different than winning trophies for Barcelona. But he’s loving it.

After Adelaide secured its first championship with a 3-1 win over Western Sydney at Adelaide Oval in front of a record 50,119 A-League fans on Sunday, the Barcelona great revealed he had suffered this year on the bench.

But just as Amor was explaining at the post-match press conference why coaching was so much tougher than playing, his squad chased the boss around the room spraying champagne at Barcelona legend.

The scenes of jubilation lasted for about five minutes and Amor was saturated from head to toe before order was restored.

He then said winning the championship as a coach was so much tougher than claiming a UEFA Champions League title and Cope Del Rey trophies with Barca.

“This is a special day for me, this is fantastic,’’ Amor said.

“Now our players can enjoy this moment a lot.

“But I think the coach suffers a lot more than a player, you are there on the bench but it’s impossible ... you can’t touch the ball ... your boys sometimes…. you can’t play the game.

Adelaide United coach Guillermo Amor celebrates with Craig Goodwin after the Reds won the A-League grand final. Picture: Morne de Klerk (Getty Images)

“But the boys in this moment are very happy and this is a great group - we have special players.”

With Amor declaring he would need to go home to change before he celebrated the championship, probably in the city, Wanderers’ coach Tony Popovic declared Adelaide had been forced to play the long ball for most of the clash.

But with the Reds so much more effective than the away side, pressing the Wanderers high, Popovic was left lamenting that losing a third grand final in four years was no fun.

“They were too quick for us and they pressed us ... we made two mistakes for their goals and they took their chances and we didn’t take ours,” Popovic said.

“It’s been a long time since they’ve been in the final and they’ve won.

“Apart from tonight it’s been a fantastic season.

“There’s one thing missing from this club and that is winning the grand final.

“We won the Champions League and the Premier’s Plate (but) we maybe didn’t do enough in the first half and it made it difficult in the second half.”

Popovic also gave Adelaide Oval a huge appraisal, claiming he had enjoyed the atmosphere but somewhat disappointed with the state of the pitch.

“We expected it (an average pitch) but in the end it wasn’t a problem,’’ he said.