Valencia coach Rino Gattuso says he was proud of his players in their Supercopa de Espana semifinal defeat to Real Madrid in Riyadh.

It ended 1-1 after regular time and then after extra time, with Karim Benzema's strike being cancelled out by Samuel Lino. Both goals came shortly either side of half time.

Jose Gaya's miss in the shootout proved the decisive penalty at the end.

Gattuso later said, "I'm very proud of the team and of the game they had. We played with a great mentality. It is the way we have to be. Against Cádiz we lacked that. We have to continue like this, because we are a young team, which has quality and mentality. Today we demonstrated that on the pitch; we played 120 minutes against a great team, with great players and a great coach. We lost, but we have to continue like this.

"I don't think the physical side took its toll on us. After 120 minutes it's normal to be the way we were. We worked a lot and ran a lot because we always had to be very careful with turnovers, and it is normal for the players to be tired after that.

"I don't know if we were better than the opposition. We had a game that tactically we prepared differently from how we have played over the last four months. We played with two central midfielders and prepared well for that. We had chances to score and also Real Madrid did. It was an open game."

On Real keeper Thibaut Courtois, he added: "Courtois is a goalkeeper who has been playing at an incredible level for many years. He is in the Top 5 in the world. Also, Mamardashvili made 4 or 5 very good saves. We haven't had much luck today, but that's football. As a player I won a World Cup on penalties and you have to be lucky, and today we weren't."