Hamburg boss Bruno Labbadia believes his side can still achieve their goal of reaching the Europa League final despite being held to a scoreless draw at home in the semi-final first leg against Fulham.

The Germans were given little chance to get forward as Fulham maintained a strong grasp in defence and through the midfield, which Labbadia expected from watching previous Cottagers matches, but he was confident his side could achieve a result in the return leg and move into the final.

"As expected this was a very difficult game and as expected they played very defensively," he said.

"I was a little bit surprised they stayed back so much.

"Our problem was that we didn't quite get enough crosses in.

"We knew there wouldn't be a way through the middle, we saw that from the Wolfsburg game.

"All in all the game's in the balance and we can still achieve what we set out to do."