Pellegrini buoyed by 'special feeling' around the club

Lorenzo Pellegrini scored his fourth and fifth goals of the fledgling 2021-22 season on Thursday night to help Roma secure a 5-1 Europa Conference League victory over CSKA Sofia.

The Giallorossi made it six wins from six to start the campaign under Jose Mourinho in impressive fashion - with Pellegrini's sublime early equaliser setting the side back on their way.

“The main thing is that it went in, and it erased the advantage they’d got with their goal,” Pellegrini said.

“It doesn’t really matter how it was scored, the key thing is we did.”

He added: “I can only thank the coach for what he’s done for me. He’s helped me so much. He needs to continue to do that, to continue helping us all to improve.

"This year there’s a special feeling around Trigoria. We need to make sure we enjoy it as much as possible so we can keep on improving. We can’t let it stop for a second if we want to one day win something.”

Pellegrini was asked what exactly had brought about the special feeling within the club.

“It’s a bit of everything,” he said. “We are well set up offensively and defensively. I don’t think that special feeling has been around the place really since I returned to the club.

“As I’ve said, we need to enjoy that and try and make the most of the atmosphere at the moment.

“I was talking with [Gonzalo] Villar on the bench towards the end. He told me, ‘Mamma mia, how great is this stadium’. I told him that the stadium with our fans in it is amazing – but we are still at just 50%. We hope that things will keep improving, that soon we will have more fans at the stadium in total safety.

“If we win games here, then it’s down to them. And we hope will have as many fans as possible in the ground with us for that.”