Gian Piero Gasperini concedes Atalanta were ‘too frenetic’ after a couple of defensive errors against Lecce ‘compromised the whole match,’ but denies he went too far with squad rotation.
La Dea suffered a shock defeat at the Stadio Via del Mare, conceding two goals in one minute from Federico Baschirotto on a corner and Federico Di Francesco after a counter-attack.
Duvan Zapata was able to get his first goal of the season, but it was not enough to secure any points.
“We were too frenetic in the second half and lost our shape, giving the ball away cheaply. We created something, but not enough,” Gasperini told DAZN.
“There are many teams who are aggressive like Lecce, we did better in the first half and created good opportunities, but in the space of five minutes we compromised the whole match and never recovered.”
Atalanta had the chance to catch Milan in second place with a win today, but instead risk sliding down the table after back-to-back defeats.
“The loss with Napoli was different, it was a very good performance. I had hoped to repeat it tonight, but we made too many mistakes in defence, then tried to resolve the situation as individuals rather than working as a unit with our usual passing moves.”
Gasperini made nine changes from the side that lost to Napoli, so was accused of over-doing it with the squad rotation.
“I made those changes because Merih Demiral was not fully fit and Rafael Toloi needed rest, while I wanted to test our lads on the wings and this seemed like the right game to do that. The changes didn’t decide the result, but the two goals we conceded after a good start.”
Duvan Zapata had his first start since the injury relapse, but Marten de Roon picked up another injury.
“That is very disappointing for De Roon.”
Jose Luis Palomino is back in the squad after he was cleared of doping, having failed a pre-season test, so could he feature against Inter?
“I don’t know, he only joined the group for training yesterday. We need to learn from these games and recover some of our injured players.”