Mancini: Inter's Europa League exit all my fault

The Nerazzurri coach has sought to deflect blame from his players, while Hernanes admits he cannot begrudge fans for whistling them against Wolfsburg

Roberto Mancini has insisted the blame for Inter's feeble exit from the Europa League to Wolfsburg on Thursday lies at his feet.

The Nerazzurri needed to overturn a 3-1 defeat from the first leg at the Volkswagen Arena but went behind after 24 minutes on home soil via the boot of Daniel Caligiuri.

Conceding first left Inter with the monumental task of scoring three goals to take the game to extra-time and, though Rodrigo Palacio's strike gave Mancini's men a faint glimmer of hope, Nicklas Bendtner wrapped up the result with a late half-volley.

The former Manchester City coach was keen to avoid making excuses and openly admitted that his team's defending is not up to scratch if they want to return to the elite of Italy or Europe.

"We must not concede goals, defending is the fundamental foundation," he told reporters in his post-match press conference. "The fault tonight is mine.

"Defence is the basis of everything: in Europe you can not give two chances and concede any goals in the first 20 minutes.

"We are as disappointed as the fans and they have every right to whistle at us. We had the chances to score more goals but, once we went behind, it became far more difficult.

"We never seem to end a match with a clean sheet. This alters how we can approach games right now. Unfortunately we keep making mistakes and conceding goals from them.

"Wolfsburg are a better team than us right now, but my regret is that we gave them too many chances on a silver platter over the two legs."

Hernanes echoed Mancini's suggestion that the fans were right to jeer them when full-time came at San Siro, with the defeat potentially signalling the last European game at the ground until at least 2016, with both Inter and AC Milan stuck in mid-table.

"It was not a nice end to our European journey," the Brazilian midfielder said. "The fans were right to whistle. We have been eliminated but now we need patience from supporters.

"We did our best, we tried to make the most of our opportunities, but clearly our best wasn't good enough. I'm sorry, at times like this we need to stand up straight and continue to try to put in good work."

Inter, who are winless in five games in all competitions, are back in action on Sunday at home to top-three challengers Sampdoria.