Crespo eyes Brasileirão recovery after Libertadores exit: “Our reality” | OneFootball

São Paulo's coach, Hernán Crespo, spoke in a defensive tone for the first time in a post-match interview.

And understandably so. Far beyond the elimination by LDU in the quarterfinals of the Copa Libertadores, the coach had to face direct questions about the consequences of the 1-0 defeat at Morumbi, the future of Tricolor, and, most importantly, his responsibility for the final result.

Well, when it came to his share of the blame, Crespo took the easy route. Even while stressing that it wasn't an excuse, he laid bare the scenario he inherited from Luis Zubeldía and how he views the team's current standing in the Brazilian Championship, fighting for a spot in next year's Libertadores.

“You already know the difficulties. There's a dynamic behind every sale and every purchase. That's the situation. I know it, and if I know it, I also know perfectly well the situation São Paulo is in. We try to do the best we can, as we have done up to now. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't. Sometimes you take over a team almost in the relegation zone... Today we're in seventh. Did it work in the Brasileirão? Yes. In the round of 16? Yes. We gave our all. But this is our reality. Today, anything I say to you might sound like an excuse. But it's not. It's reality,” he said.

“I'm not here to lie. I believed. We created many chances. Did we play badly? Did we deserve to go out? We didn't. Do you really think we deserved to lose here? I'm not saying we played very well. Could we play better? Yes, much better. But what we saw was that we could have won. We hit the post, Luciano had chances. After that, what happens with other people, the fans, the board, I can't control. Everyone reacts as they see fit,” he added.

“The only way out of this difficult, painful situation is to work. And to believe, to keep going. I think in football, many times you get what you put in, but sometimes two plus two is seven. And in this tie with LDU, two plus two was seven. We didn't deserve to lose there and we did. Here, in the first half, we created a lot, maybe could have taken the lead, but they came and scored a goal,” he pointed out.

Regarding the most controversial decision, putting Rigoni in as right wing-back, the coach tried to explain his point of view.

“It's not the first time he's played there, even with me he's played there before, against 9 de Julho in the Copa do Brasil. With Rigoni, Ferreira, and Luciano and the runs from Rodriguinho and Bobadilla, we could have produced well, and we did, but we didn't convert. We didn't play badly, the team played well, could have played better, always can, but strategically what we created wasn't turned into goals,” he explained.

“The idea was that the LDU game was already 2-0. We had to take risks, do something different. I think by putting five up front, giving width, with the characteristics we have... Mailton crosses. And who could score with a header? Dinenno. So, both had to be on. A lot of things happen. I thought, maybe wrongly, that with this scheme, this strategy, we created three clear chances in the first half, with Rigoni, Luciano, and Bobadilla. The game was there. Then, if you don't convert, a mistake happens. It's part of it. It changes everything. We already put in Maílton, Dinenno. Lucas made an effort. We tried. We tried to put in all the firepower we had available, except Lucas, who wasn't 100%. The rest, those on the bench, had one problem or another. Is that an excuse? No. That's how it is. It's a fact. It's a fact that you have to breathe, look for solutions. Obviously, the solutions we tried didn't work. But that was the game,” Crespo concluded.

Still in this atmosphere of veiled criticism, the Argentine coach also refused to evaluate his own work, competent in the Brasileirão, but disappointing in knockout competitions, with two eliminations and no wins in the Libertadores.

“My evaluation? At the end of the season. Never before. Have you ever done that in your life? No. At the end. What happened? In the middle, maybe the board. We talk at the end. For the objective we reached, much more than positive. When we got here, all anyone talked about was relegation. We only talked about relegation. That the Copa do Brasil didn't matter. And you know how we went out of the Copa do Brasil. You know how we went out of the Libertadores. You know all the situations. What was the real situation when we arrived? Hypothetically it was 15th with one point (from the drop zone). Today, we're talking about maybe having another shot at the Copa Libertadores. We have to believe, be together, to create a new opportunity. What's your evaluation? With all these things. Are we hurting? A lot. Are we in a bad place? Very bad. But on Monday we have to show our faces again. It's time for the whole group to be together, like a family, and come out of a very painful elimination. To get out of a very painful situation, you have to be close to people who care. And this group is a family. I think the group will come out and try to quickly overcome this pain. But it won't be easy,” he said.

This article was translated into English by Artificial Intelligence. You can read the original version in 🇧🇷 here.