Bavagnoli proud despite late heartbreak

The Giallorosse pushed reigning league champions Juventus all the way in their semi-final match-up, forcing extra-time despite going down to 10 men – and only losing out to a 115th-minute Cristina Girelli strike.

Given the side’s poor start to the Serie A campaign, along with their 4-1 defeat to Juventus in their last outing, Bavagnoli believes such a determined display will stand the side in good stead going forward.

“Today I got the response I wanted,” Bavagnoli said.

“Obviously we are disappointed not to have reached the final, but I am proud of the performance my girls put in. They prepared well for this game and they really did well – but then little incidents changed the game and going down to 10 players clearly didn’t help us.”

An early missed penalty from Andressa Alves was further punished by Barbara Bonansea’s almost immediate opener, before Allyson Swaby fired home early in the second half to set up extra-time.

Bavagnoli added: “We were unlucky in the first half with the missed penalty, but that’s football for you. We had to really sacrifice and work hard for each other, and after the last game against Juventus we tried to correct our mistakes and put more emphasis on where we can hurt them – which I think we did at times.

“If we had been a bit more clinical and precise in key moments perhaps we could have come away with more, but I think we did ourselves proud in an important competition like this.”

Bavagnoli wants to see a similar hunger from her side as attention turns to the second half of the league campaign.

“We need to take the positives from this performance and go into the league looking to make amends for everything that didn’t go right for us in the first half of the season,” Bavagnoli said.

“I believe that, after this display today, there is both the belief and the quality within the squad to play against anyone and win, and we need to go into the upcoming games with the same courage we had today.

“I think after this game we will see a different Roma in the future.”