Gasperini previews Roma-Pisa, discusses season finale | OneFootball

Despite the dark period Roma is going through, Gian Piero Gasperini still believes.

“The season isn’t over,” the coach repeated to the team in the days leading up to the crucial home match against Hiljemark’s Pisa.

The Piedmontese coach held his usual pre-match press conference at Trigoria and spoke about the team’s current form: “Meanwhile, I think Mancini will recover as early as next week. I hope so with Wesley, too; they seem to be fine. So, the injuries—the injuries they’ve suffered—are definitely less serious. Dybala is already doing quite well, but he’s a bit more unpredictable, I think a week or two.”

“The injuries have certainly been detrimental from a certain point on, late December onward, especially because they’ve been so long, not because of the number of injuries. For example, what happened now with Wesley for the national team, but these are injuries that are expected of a team of players who play so many games for so many months.”

“When you miss a week or two, not months, as is unfortunately normal in football. We’ve had very long-term injuries, starting with Ferguson, Bailey, Dovbyk, followed by Dybala, Soulé—I struggle to remember them all, but definitely at least 6 or 7, over so many months. This has been It was a really difficult season in this regard, also because we had so many muscular problems.”

“We haven’t had many players with very few muscular problems, some have, recently with Hermoso, but it was something particularly extraordinary in football. Then, of course, some ailments, some players had to miss a game, like Mancini now, perhaps. There were players with the same Mancini, broken noses, who played with masks, some with aches and pains. We certainly had a decline due, in part, to this constant emergency, which we had before in attack, because we had so many injuries. But we lost Ferguson, Dovbyk, Dybala, Soulé, even Baldanzi left, that is, he was no longer there, and then after that a bit of a decline began in defense too.”

On the possible revolution in the summer: “Right now, let’s not think about the future, let’s think about the present. The second half in Milan definitely mustn’t happen. There was definitely a decline, a collapse in mood, and that’s the one thing that must never happen, because this is a team that has a clear conscience for how they worked, how they interpreted the games, for how they’ve gone about their entire journey this season. So, nothing, it’s a team that reacts, they’re serious guys, committed, motivated, who want to try to do their best. I know that tomorrow night will still be a match, even though we’re facing a team that was almost relegated, but we know very well that Pisa is a tough team, that has also played in recent games, that games must be won.”

“It’s clear that we must now do much better in terms of results, we don’t have much margin for error and we must start from this match, knowing that Serie A games may become easier later on, but they are always very complicated, with great unity, with the determination to stay in the league. We know that if If we win tomorrow, we’ll get closer to someone. Well, it depends on the results, but we can take that step forward.”

On the many players whose contracts are expiring and Pellegrini’s future: “First of all, this situation isn’t new; it’s been around since the beginning of the year. So since it wasn’t addressed before, it’s remained unchanged, and therefore it’s absolutely nothing new. These are serious guys. It’s unpredictable now what will happen in a month, a month and a half; it depends on the owners’ will, it depends on the players’ will. The situation is very clear, very clear. Who has expiring contracts, who is on loan, who could potentially be on the market due to the well-known, in short, financial improvements. But these are situations that don’t concern anyone right now. Pellegrini, at the end of the match, had lost 5-2 in Milan and put his face forward, he went to the interview. I don’t know if we’re incapable of telling anyone what will happen today, but I know that these are all guys; I owe a lot and am very grateful to this entire group for how they’ve interpreted the season so far.”

“And on this, it’s not like I change my mind after a defeat. I’m still Grateful, I really want to work with them to finish the season strong, possibly with a goal that’s still achievable, which has become much more difficult, one that no one had expected us to achieve, at least outside of Rome. We’ve achieved that goal, and we still really want to try to reach it. This is the situation. What happens next in a month is unpredictable, but perhaps even in the last games we all play together, we’ll play to the best of our ability, and that’s important to be clear. Then we could say we were good or not so good, but never that we didn’t try and give it our all.”

On what players like El Shaarawy, Vaz, and Zaragoza have been missing: “If you look at players like me, I make choices, so it’s not like I obviously let Mancini play, but Ghilardi has played a lot. Vaz has played more than he did at Marseille. Nothing’s missing; everyone in this team has played and is playing. Then, if you want Vaz to play in place of Malen, if you want Ghilardi to play in place of, I don’t know, Ndicka, sure, there’s a team, there’s a team that plays consistently. There are players who are playing, who are coming in, and who I think have also improved, including the ones you’re talking about. If that’s not enough for them, I don’t know.”

On the negative period: “Certainly all the declines we’ve had have been very serious. From a certain point in the championship onwards, they undoubtedly weighed on us. This doesn’t mean we haven’t always tried to stay as high as possible. From when we were very high up, when we slipped a bit lower, now continuing. Then on the discussion of what the value is, whether a player should start or do without him, whether the team can win the Scudetto, can finish third, second, fourth, among the opponents, the comparison with the opponents, everyone is free to make their own assessments. My assessment is that this is a team we put ourselves among the four. We set the goal. Regardless of the opponents, who are certainly worthy, we set that goal for ourselves. We want to reach it, and if we don’t manage it, we will have done our best to try to reach it. So we set the goal. Then, if there have been injuries, if the team is not complete, if all that series of conditions are present, everyone is free to make their own assessments. We’ve set a goal. Right now we have seven games to go. We still have, and regardless of the goals, more or less, until the last game, which we’ll play in Verona on May 24th, we’ll always be serious people. This is our duty.”

Gasperini then spoke about the difficulties that can arise during a match and his approach to the game: “So, up until ten minutes into the second half, we played an excellent game in Milan; there were no technical issues. In ten minutes, we conceded three goals, and the game went in a direction it had never gone in the league. So in that respect, I think we’ve always played excellent games, but then we lost a few too many, often due to incidents. We won a lot of games, we won 18. And because I believe the way to go is to win games, then it would be nice not to lose, to draw the ones that do… But in that respect, Roma is like that. That’s my way of interpreting football, that’s my way of, and it’s no coincidence, achieving goals.”

On the difficulties that have emerged in Rome in recent months: “I think the only goal is always to try to improve teams, to make them stronger. When teams are stronger and therefore have a better chance of achieving results, everything gets fixed, everything works. Everything works great. So that’s the only thing I think about: how to try to make teams stronger and stronger. When you do that, everything in football works.”

On a possible starting spot for El Aynaoui: “He hasn’t played recently, and not after the Africa Cup of Nations. In my opinion, he’s had some difficulties, it was touchy. But he’s a healthy guy, as I’ve said many times, a guy who in a certain period before the Africa Cup of Nations was doing very well and also played with great consistency. Lately, in the games in which he came on or started, he’s certainly not performed as well as he did some time ago, but, as I said before, he’s a healthy guy, so I’m confident he can do well again.”

The coach then spoke about his future, explaining how his permanence shouldn’t depend on the club’s achievement: “If the management does it, it doesn’t make sense. But I don’t know who… I’m all for free thought. Everyone, especially the passionate ones, the fans, etc., are truly important and free to express their thoughts. It’s a form of thought, if that’s even true: if you arrive, good, otherwise you’re out. I can’t say that the owners never said we’d go to the Champions League this year; I said so. So, it’s okay.”

Gasperini then spoke about the players he considers indispensable: “I think, as I said before, teams, in order to always try to improve, not before considering giving up what you have, you have to understand what you bring. Then, this is always the focal point, right? We all want, I don’t know, Messi, Ronaldo, whoever, but then afterward, you always have to understand this. And the goal is to improve the teams from time to time. It seems to me that Roma, I saw on Transfermarkt, so it’s a simple thing, have signed 30 players in the last two years. Of which, maybe 4 or 5 are playing right now, maybe less. If you ask me, and I don’t think I’m blaming anyone, but it’s my opinion, maybe there’s a need for targets, maybe less this and maybe more that. Also because Roma has seen important players and important teams, so the fans know the strong ones, they’ve seen them. Maybe I’m more inclined to that type of idea than 30 players, but that’s my idea. It could also be that I agree, it’s not a problem.”

Finally, on the characteristics that could be useful for the Roma of the future: “This is a choice the club has to make, but there are many ways. One is to go for players with very high contracts, as has happened, and that perhaps the owners no longer have any intention of doing that. The other is to go for very young players, which I don’t know if a club like Roma can accept. If you put so many young players on the pitch, you probably also lower the team’s ambitions. Another thing is the target, but is that it, within these right targets, costs, salaries, is it easy? No, maybe it’s possible, if that’s the target, you work on that. And then you try, if you find 10, well done, if you find two, put two. That’s how I see it, as a situation. Then you have to make things happen. But first you have to understand the path forward, I think that’s the most important thing.”

“So, today I really wanted to try to clarify as much as possible, so now after the seven games you can leave me alone on these topics. And let’s hope. No, no, also because it’s Right, right? Because otherwise you’ll always be more of a worker, you’ll come up with things. Outside of these conferences, I don’t talk to you, and you know it. Because you all have my phone number, but if you look, there’s not a single message from me, not a single phone call from me. Maybe from the first days I arrived here, from when we met, period. So, I have no other news to give you, I told you everything today, and then we’ll see each other next Friday, that there’s another great match. Enough, I wanted to try to be as clear as possible, also to clear up all this gossip, and I hope I’ve said I’ve been clear enough. Now, for me, Pisa tomorrow is the only thing, if we play and manage to win a match. Tomorrow night we’ll be a little happier.”