Adi Hütter: "Our goal is to get a good result in Lens" | OneFootball

Keen to finish the season well in Lens on the final day of Ligue 1, the Monaco coach spoke at a press conference on the eve of this match in the Nord (Saturday, 9 p.m.).

End the season on a good note. Assured of a place in the Champions League after last weekend with a win over Lyon (2-0), AS Monaco’s players will finish their season in the Nord, where they will travel to face Lens this Saturday (9 p.m.). It’s a match that the Monegasque manager Adi Hütter wants to approach seriously in order to finish in style and perhaps even steal second place from Marseille at the same time. 🎙️

We are going to Lens to try to win because we still have the possibility of finishing second since we don't know what Marseille will do in the meantime. It's our goal to get a good result against a good Lens team. Finishing second would be a great achievement and could give us the opportunity to play in the Trophée des Champions, as we did this season,

The fitness of Folarin Balogun

Folarin will be absent this weekend, along with Moatasem Al-Musrati and Aleksandr Golovin. He was a bit unlucky before the match against Lyon, injuring himself in a training duel. One of his ligaments was damaged, which is painful. He trained yesterday, but there’s no way he’ll be able to help us in Lens. As for the rest, we’ll see who will be traveling after the final training session this afternoon.

Expectations for this final match

We are going to Lens to try to win because we still have the possibility of finishing second since we don’t know what Marseille will do in the meantime. It’s our goal to get a good result against a good Lens team. Finishing second would be a great achievement and could give us the opportunity to play in the Trophée des Champions, as we did this season, depending on PSG’s result in the Coupe de France final. We will have to do our job and we will see what OM will do.

The last week of training

You can imagine that after the match against Lyon, there was an explosion of joy in the locker room because no one expected the three teams behind us to lose. Having achieved our Champions League goal and securing a podium finish, it definitely changed our training week. Congratulations to the Club, as everyone deserved this qualification! I’m also happy for all our supporters.

The last two starts for Jordan Teze

Many players like Vanderson have played a lot. This is his first real season with so many games to play, between the Champions League, the Brazilian national team and the Trophée des Champions. So it’s bound to create fatigue, even though he’s had a fantastic season.

Of course, everyone wants to play, but you have to protect him because he’s the third-most-played player in the squad. I’m happy that Jordan played well in recent games and seized his opportunity. He’s also done a good job in training over the past few weeks, so he deserved to be a starter.

Next season’s squad

We’re still working on continuity. Everyone knows we’ve had a good season, with a successful Champions League campaign. We have several talented players in the squad. Everyone knows that Eric Dier joins us this summer, while others may want to join other clubs.

I like him a lot. I've been watching him for several years when he was still at Tottenham, where he's a legend there. He also has many England caps and is coming off a great season with Bayern Munich. He's very humble, he's both a leader and a very good defender. He'll be able to help us with his personality, I'm happy he's joining us this summer. He's a good player who will fit in well in the dressing room.

We may have to sell some during the transfer window, but I’m sure we’ll have a great team next year. I also think AS Monaco is an attractive club for many players because we fight for the top spots in Ligue 1 every year. The Principality is also a great place to live.

I like him a lot. I’ve been watching him for several years when he was still at Tottenham, where he’s a legend there. He also has many England caps and is coming off a great season with Bayern Munich. He’s very humble, he’s both a leader and a very good defender. He’ll be able to help us with his personality, I’m happy he’s joining us this summer. He’s a good player who will fit in well in the dressing room.

(A midfield role?) We clearly signed him to play as a defender. Denis Zakaria is a number 6 and can also play in defense, but I repeat, we signed him to be in defense, even though he can help out in an emergency.

A second consecutive Champions League qualification, the team’s first since 2018

I’m proud, of course. As a coach, when you arrive at a new club and want to implement a new style of play, it’s always a difficult job, but we weren’t playing any international competitions. With the Champions League this season and 11 more games to play, I think it’s a greater accomplishment, especially since we lost key players like Wissam Ben Yedder, Youssouf Fofana, Guillermo Maripan, Mohamed Camara or Ismail Jakobs.

In return, we signed several talented players. This is a great source of pride for the team and the coaching staff, especially since we had a similar end to the season as last year. I had received several questions about us not being able to beat big teams, but that has since been resolved with victories against Nice, Marseille and Lyon. It’s a great succcess for the Club.

We’ll resume training with the squad at the end of June for the traditional two or three-day medical tests, while the first official training session will take place at the beginning of July. Training camp will then take place, the location of which is still secret.