Antonio Rudiger spoke to German media about life at Roma, the Serie A focus on tactics and dealing with racism in the derby with Lazio.
The 24-year-old defender has been at the club since the summer of 2015 and is currently on international duty.
“It was truly difficult to recover from the ruptured anterior cruciate ligament, but now I am happy with my physical fitness,” he told Sportbuzzer.de.
“It was above all tough to watch my teammates step on to the field while I had to work for hours and hours in the gym.
Antonio Rudiger spoke to German media about life at Roma, the Serie A focus on tactics and dealing with racism in the derby with Lazio.
The 24-year-old defender has been at the club since the summer of 2015 and is currently on international duty.
“It was truly difficult to recover from the ruptured anterior cruciate ligament, but now I am happy with my physical fitness,” he told Sportbuzzer.de.
“It was above all tough to watch my teammates step on to the field while I had to work for hours and hours in the gym.
“Here in Italy tactics are everything. At the Trigoria training ground we spend up to an hour and a half analysing video footage and on the field spent over an hour studying tactics.
“I grew up in Berlin, so one day I might return to the Bundesliga, but now I am very happy to be in Rome. The city is beautiful and the food is exceptional. Admittedly, there isn’t much privacy…
“It has become normal now to sit next to Francesco Totti and I can speak to him in Italian too. Sometimes I look over him at think: ‘Wow, it’s Francesco Totti! And he’s sitting next to me!’ That has happened quite a lot.”
There have been some negatives to his Roma experience, specifically the racist chants during the derby with Lazio and insults from Aquile defender Senad Lulic.
“It’s a shame these things happen in 2017. I didn’t react when I heard the chants during the derby, because otherwise I’d have been even more stupid than them.
“This never happened to be in Germany, as Berlin is a very multi-cultural city and even as a child I never faced racism. We were German, Asian, Arab, all together and always respected each other.”