Atalanta manager Gian Piero Gasperini spoke to DAZN following his team’s 3-2 victory over Fiorentina, reflecting on the match and looking ahead to their upcoming Champions League fixture.
When asked about the significance of today’s win after two previous defeats, Gasperini said, “Undoubtedly, we were coming from two different defeats. In Milan, we compromised the match immediately, while in Turin, we had our chances but wasted a penalty at the end. Today was a difficult challenge. Fiorentina has changed many players like us, but we played a good game with good morale despite going behind twice.”
Regarding the integration of new signings, Gasperini explained, “Clearly, many of the new players have arrived very recently, and then there was the international break. Zaniolo trained with us for the first week, and Cuadrado had a small ankle sprain, otherwise I would have liked to bring him on. At this moment, I’m relying on who I had because the team needs to find consolidated mechanisms, and the three up front are working very well, in fact, they all scored.”
Gasperini expressed concern about defensive issues, particularly on set pieces: “We continue to concede goals from set pieces, and we’ll work on that. We must recover Zaniolo, otherwise we risk being short up front.”
When questioned about his visible frustration during Fiorentina’s second goal, Gasperini elaborated, “If you notice, on the first goal, the only one who remained marking was Retegui. On this one, Ruggeri makes a bad diagonal run and keeps Kean onside. But it’s clear that on these balls, we can remedy quickly. We’ve already conceded several goals like this, but I believe we can fix it quickly despite falling for it easily at the moment.”
Looking ahead to the Champions League, Gasperini commented, “We’ll certainly play against an opponent with fantastic dynamism, against a team that has dominated the Premier League alongside Liverpool and Manchester City. Arsenal is definitely a great test because we’ve faced many big teams, but certainly with different characteristics. We’ll definitely need to snatch points because every match is really important.”
