Fonseca delighted by side's fighting spirit

Paulo Fonseca saw his side dig deep to emerge 4-3 winners against Spezia on Saturday afternoon.

The Giallorossi finished a disappointing week with a much-needed positive result, as Lorenzo Pellegrini fired home deep into injury time to clinch a three points that perhaps could and should have been secured with much less fuss.

Here's what the boss had to say after the game....

Could this be a positive turning point for Roma?

“Very positive. If we had not won today, it would have been incredibly unfair based on how the game went. It was a performance that showed the team’s spirit. A lot of the boys played 120 minutes in the cup on Tuesday, and they still showed a real desire to win. And it was really important to win today. I think that we fully deserved the three points.”

In the final few minutes you saw that team spirit shine through…

“Yes, the group is united. It was an incredible moment, because the team had worked really hard and deserved to win it at the end. It showed the team spirit, and I really liked that.”

Pellegrini played high and wide on the left a lot and that caused problems for Spezia: is that what you worked on beforehand?

“Yes. The most important thing was the work put in by the most forward players, who always tried to run into spaces. We prepared the game knowing that it would be really important to break those lines and Pellegrini, Borja [Mayoral] and [Carles] Perez did a great job.”

Roma create a lot of chances, but why do they concede so many goals from individual mistakes?

“Everyone in football knows that there are moments like that, when it isn’t a result of a tactical problem. We are going through a moment where teams take advantage of our mistakes. I only know one way to change that: we have to work harder to ensure we avoid those moments. The three Spezia goals today aren’t a fair reflection of how we played and defended. We created a lot of chances and we won really well.”