U19, Pisacane: “Proud of these guys.”

Rossoblù Under 19 coach Fabio Pisacane spoke to the media after the match against Sampdoria.

AWARENESS AND REGRET
“The draw is tight for us, but that’s what football is all about: the boys are learning about the unforeseen events of this sport. Even in the first leg we would have deserved something more, but – after a match like today’s – if you don’t make the full haul it’s more for your own demerit than for the merits of the opponents. At the end of the game the boys were very sorry, they wanted a win. But in the locker room I said I was proud to coach them: for at least fifty minutes it was a pleasure to watch them play, I saw everything we had prepared during the week, these are things that gratify a coach.”

THE RIGHT WAY
“The negative aspects were there and we have to keep working to improve the flaws; to win a game you have to be obsessed with details. In the first half the score should have been wider; in the second half – as was logical – they raised their center of gravity to recover the disadvantage. We dropped both mentally and physically: it is very difficult to play the whole game as we did in the first half. The result does not gratify us, but the road we have mapped out is the right one.”

THE EVER-HIGH ATTENTION SPAN
“Not having Arba, with Cogoni – a central defender – playing the low flank, we tried to codify certain mechanisms during the week. We knew that they would line up with very tight lines and at the beginning they even surprised us a bit, they proposed the 5-4-1: they had done it only once this year, against Inter in Milan. This, as I told the boys, must gratify them because it means that Cagliari today is a tough, feared opponent. That is why our level must always remain high.”

EVERY MATCH A FINAL
“Play-off target? We are definitely not satisfied with what we have done so far, points are never enough: I will ask the boys to go into the next matches as if they were finals, an attitude that has been our hallmark from the beginning anyway. Then you can win, lose: but there are thirty points up for grabs between now and the end of the season. The guys have to clear their heads: every time we get to play a game like today’s, which could allow you to take a step forward toward our dream, we fail to hit the three points. We go on from game to game, we’ll come to terms in the end.”

INDIVIDUALS
“Carboni was out two weeks after a shoulder subluxation, now he is on the rise: he spent a lot in the first half, so I preferred to preserve him in the second half, inserting Sulev who gave us freshness and dynamism in the middle. At that point Malfitano went to play, a role he can fill by giving us centimeters and wide trajectory coverage. Caddeo is still out, I hope he will soon be back with us; Arba also worked this week on a personalized basis, I hope that from next week he can gradually rejoin the group and then be available for the Empoli away game. Meanwhile, I want to applaud Cogoni, who had to adapt to a new role and always played with merit.”