By DPA
Athens : After watching Liverpool lose 2-1 to AC Milan in the Champions League final, manager Rafa Benitez admitted that his team needs significant investment if it is to compete at the very highest level.
"When you win, you are pleased and happy; when you lose you have to think about why and have to start thinking about the future," Benitez said after the match Wednesday. "You need to start thinking about how to improve your team."
He seems already to have begun that process, and suggested there would be significant changes.
"My first idea is to support my players," Benitez said. "They worked really hard and did their best.
"After we think about the future and look to how we can improve. We can go forward maybe more than one step at a time."
Asked if he thought sufficient funds would be available from the club's new owners, the Americans, George Gillett and Tom Hicks, he replied: "I hope so."
His implication was that the players he had on the field were not good enough.
"You could see the players working hard," he said.
"It's not easy to achieve more than today. To be closer to Manchester United and Chelsea (who finished ahead of Liverpool in the Premiership) or the Champions League we need to take a couple of steps."
Benitez was quick to congratulate Milan on their victory, but he was disappointed that the referee, Herbert Fandel, did not play the full three minutes of injury-time he had indicated would be added at the end of the game.
Although that difference was a matter of seconds, given Liverpool had the momentum having scored late through Dirk Kuyt, it could have made a difference.
"It was two minutes, 45.51 seconds, and he said three minutes," Benitez said.
"I don't want to say more. It could have made a difference, but I don't want to use these things as an excuse.
"At the end of the day we needed to score in 90 minutes. If you play more time, it is better, but I don't want to use this as excuse. We played well until we conceded the first goal."
After that, Milan were able to exploit the spaces left as Liverpool pushed forwards.
"When you don't have fresh legs you leave big spaces behind," Benitez explained. "We couldn't keep this hard work up and that was maybe the difference.
"The second goal was clear – there was a big space in the middle and then they played between the lines."
Filippo Inzaghi got it, his second of the night, running on to a Kaka through-ball and rounding Jose Reina to score.