Maurizio Sarri was proud of his Lazio squad after their resilient 1-0 win over Fiorentina, believing the performance shows the team’s mental growth.
The Biancocelesti almost fell 1-0 down in the early stages of the match after Lucas Beltran’s opener, but a VAR check ruled out the goal due to a handball in the build-up. The Viola hit the post just minutes later, doing everything but finding the back of the net.
Lazio performed far better in the second half of the match but were wasteful with their chances, leaving them at risk of being held to a draw at the Stadio Olimpico. In the last minute of the match, Ciro Immobile buried a penalty to secure the win following a Nikola Milenkovic handball.
Speaking in a press conference (via La Lazio Siamo Noi) after the match, Sarri first reflected on Lazio’s win over Fiorentina.
In the last few games, Lazio have scored points, performed well and won difficult games like today’s. Fiorentina are a team with great dribbling and that puts you in difficulty, as we saw in the first half.
Then the team grew, in the second half we risked nothing and produced four or five scoring opportunities.
This certifies that the victory is deserved, now we must continue because if you want to stay in important areas of the table, you pay for zero points against medium-low level teams.
He was asked to explain certain moments of poor form.
We are not Bayern Munich. When we play against teams of the same level as us over the course of the matches, moments of suffering certainly emerge.
There are some strange mental reactions, because the goal scored by Fiorentina should have given us fuel, but instead we it led to suffering for a few minutes, as if we were intimidated after that situation.
It’s nothing new, but compared to the previous two years we have improved in our ability to stay in the game. In the previous games against them we conceded many scoring opportunities, today not. On this basis we won.
The Lazio coach commented on the growth of the new signings.
The growth process of the new players isn’t even very slow. The kids come from other leagues, except for a few, they don’t know the language.
Our problem at the start of the season was the old ones didn’t perform as well as last season.
Now we begin to enter a phase of the season in which we will have to consider them all Lazio players, neither new nor old.
Sarri spoke about the work of midfielder Daichi Kamada.
Kamada is a player that I like very much. He plays simply and moves the ball naturally. He doesn’t have long plays, but he has good insertions.
Unfortunately, when he plays with Luis Alberto, in moments when the game gets out of hand he suffers and this one, like the one against Feyenoord, was already his own.
In recent times I have preferred to make different choices and when I lined them up together, I put Vecino at the top. I’m sorry not to use him more.
He commented on the current form of captain Immobile.
The goal can certainly help him. But I think Immobile needs to do what he hasn’t done in the last six months, train continuously.
When a 33-year-old player finds himself doing fifteen days of training on and off for months, it’s clear that his condition is declining and this from a psychological point of view makes him suffer.
The goal can help him, but above all it will help him train for a couple of months without interruptions.
We’re lucky to have Castellanos who is fitting in quite well, on the other hand this morning he should have been called up to the national team for the first time.
At this moment it is right to reward this boy, but it is not a failure for Ciro. We are waiting for him.
The Italian coach spoke about the solidity of the Biancocelesti squad.
Last year we had a long period in which we remained in the game due to solidity. This year we are doing so with more difficulty, even if in recent times we have been giving positive signs.
Today we are remaining there with more suffering, but also with the ability to go further. This is a positive point from a character point of view.
Then you have to grow in personality because you still suffer in some stages.
Finally, Sarri was asked if the last missing piece for Lazio was their right wing.
On the right there is Felipe Anderson who I love. He is potentially the strongest player in this team, if he puts aside his character defects and inconsistency, he would play in the best clubs in the world. Yesterday he had a perfect training session.
I told him that if today he had done 15 minutes of that hour of training we would have been set. He shows phenomenal things. We perhaps lack a winger who is good at going deep without the ball.
When we find teams that send us man against man it is clear that he facilitates the opponent’s aggressiveness, but you get around it by attacking from behind.
