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“I could congratulate my players on their performance, but that would be living a fairy tale and not facing up to reality. We’re Roma but we have to play like Roma – we should come to these grounds to show people who we are. We need to improve quickly because it’s not OK. We must do better.”
“I could congratulate my players on their performance, but that would be living a fairy tale and not facing up to reality. We’re Roma but we have to play like Roma – we should come to these grounds to show people who we are. We need to improve quickly because it’s not OK. We must do better.”
- Luciano Spalletti
These are just a few of the words that Luciano Spalletti said directly following Roma’s 2-0 loss to Real Madrid in Spain, which saw the side knocked out of the Champions’ League on a 4-0 aggregate score in the first knockout round.
The entire interview is well worth reading because of what it truly says about this Roma side, where it’s been and where it’s going.
Luciano Spalletti was powerful, direct and insightful. He did not beat around the bush or try to downplay what happened. Yes, Mohamed Salah and Edin Dzeko could have – nay, should have – at least gotten a few goals past Keylor Navas to make the tie more interesting.
How much their goals would have changed the course of the tie is impossible to say - a wounded Real may be far more dangerous than one sitting pretty on a 2-0 lead, not terribly concerned about pressing forward and leaving space behind for Roma to exploit. The coach himself noted that Real are not quite as irrepressible as they’ve been at their glittering best; their third place position and firing of Rafa Benitez reinforces the notion that this season has not been a golden one, that Real could have been there for the taking.
And, in fact, they were, and Spalletti’s ire and expectations were laid bare shortly thereafter the side failed to do so. Roma’s resurgence has been spectacular under the Italian, but just because they faced a tough opponent does not mean that there should ever be pride in a defeat.
Being knocked out of a competition is not something worthy of praise; in fact, Spalletti noted that there are some matches that “go down in football history and give you a shortcut to success”.
For Italian clubs against Spanish sides, several spring to mind. Think of Arrigo Sacchi’s Milan against Real Madrid, or Jose Mourinho’s Inter against Pep Guardiola’s Barcelona, or even Roma against Real Madrid, eight short years ago, where the side went through after winning both legs 2-1.
In those moments, good teams can become great, and sometimes great teams can become legendary, but those teams do that one basic thing that every football team needs to do to win: put the ball into the net.
That of course doesn’t mean there’s nothing to build off of, that everything about the two ties was horrible, or that the side were embarrassed and comprehensively outclassed. There should be some recognition that Roma went to the Bernabeu and were not overwhelmed; that a side playing with an injury-stricken backline and midfield did quite well against one of the most expensive teams ever assembled, both in their own home court and in their adversary’s; and that, with just better finishing, the tie could have gone very different, and even without the finishing, was quite different from some of the side’s higher-profile Champions’ League matches against Spanish and German teams within the past two years.
That, however, is exactly Spalletti’s point.
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