MADRID, 16 May. (EUROPA PRESS) –
The coach of Atlético de Madrid, Diego Pablo Simeone, was satisfied with the qualification for the next Champions League, and although he warned that he is the “first” who wants to “become champion”, he values ”very much” what his team has been doing because “it is not easy to win”, while he praised Antoine Griezmann’s great game against Getafe.
“I met him in the elevator going down for the talk and I told him ‘What bad luck to meet the coach in the elevator, you are in silence three, four floors away.’ I asked him how he was and he told me that it was very good. He replied that ‘Great, I hope we can see it,'” Simeone said at a press conference after the game.
The Argentine celebrated that the Frenchman “appeared.” “When he plays well, beyond the goals, he gives us hierarchy, he gives us possession, he gives us to interpret the game, he gives us fluidity in the circulation of the ball, but there were also very important performances, that of the center backs, the from Rodrigo de Paul, from Barrios, from Llorente, the truth is that there were very good performances,” he indicated.
The ‘Cholo’ was satisfied with sealing his presence in the next Champions League, something very important “for the club above all and for the work of the footballers, the coaching staff and all the people who work around the team.” “It means once again being able to reach our main objectives, which is to continue in the Champions League, continue growing, and continue to get excited to always look for better things,” he said.
In this sense, the mattress coach asked to evaluate what was done. “They taught me that if you don’t value what you do, you’re ‘screwed’ because others will never value you. I greatly value what we’ve been doing, the work that the club does, the work that the footballers do. year after year they generate to reach this important objective for the growth of the club, so that better players can come and so that the team continues competing,” he warned.
“Then of course, there are the other teams that are very good, like Real Madrid, like Barcelona, and now Girona appeared this season, which is competing very well. I think that in the Copa del Rey we did very well, unfortunately not “We were able to play the game we wanted forcefully in the first leg and in the Champions League we also had the game with many possibilities of progressing to that semi-final that we wanted so much, but that is an incentive to continue wanting to improve,” he added.
For Simeone, what he has achieved “is not easy” and he also made it clear that he wants “to be the champion more than anyone.” “I have been working since I arrived here 12 years ago with a tremendous hope of being a champion, of inflating the balloon in the best way, but there are times when we get punctured,” he recalled.
“And we try to fight against monsters. We have Real Madrid in our league, which got us 22 points, Barcelona which for now three or six. We reached the semifinals of the Copa del Rey and we fought in the quarterfinals in the Champions League. I am the first who wants to be champion, have no doubt, but it is not easy, not at all, but let’s value what we have because if not, this is like everything, when you have something you don’t value it and when you don’t say that it had to be valued, why. “Because it’s not easy to win,” he said.
The Atlético de Madrid coach avoided talking about the team’s grades because “the season has to finish first” and that will be when they can “debate whether it is extraordinary, good or average”, while he blamed the lack of “forcefulness” for having been able to go further in the Cup and the Champions League.
Finally, Simeone praised the team’s defensive improvement after three consecutive games without conceding. “We have been working very well as a team, we have improved in that aspect. I think that in these three games the team has understood well what game to play in each of the games, also with the game with Athletic, which we did quite well defensively” , he stressed.
“And that makes you grow. If you look at the numbers of all the teams that finish in the leagues and in the Champions League that concede the fewest goals, they are the ones that end up coming closest to winning. We have to improve in that area, we have we have had for many years and in these last few games we have recovered it and we hope to maintain it until the end,” he wished.
2024-05-15 22:37:02
#champion #greatly
