Sarri: ‘Don’t judge Lazio on Galatasaray result’

Maurizio Sarri insists he saw ‘progress’ from Lazio and the 1-0 Europa League defeat to Galatasaray decided by a Thomas Strakosha howler should not be ‘judged on a fortuitous result.’

The Aquile suffered their second consecutive defeat after the 2-0 at Milan in Serie A, starting the Europa League group phase in the worst way with a 1-0 defeat in Istanbul.

It was decided by a howler from goalkeeper Thomas Strakosha, who was getting his first start of the season.

Europa League | Galatasaray 1-0 Lazio: Strakosha howler is a gift

“I think we made progress, it was a different game compared to Sunday in a difficult atmosphere against a dangerous team, yet we never really suffered,” Sarri told Sky Sport Italia.

“The game was under control, then unfortunately errors are part of the sport and we paid the price for that tonight.”

Sarri made fewer changes to the starting XI than expected in Istanbul, yet still wasted chances with Sergej Milinkovic-Savic and Ciro Immobile.

“We care about the Europa League. At this moment, we cannot afford to change eight players from one match to the next. We changed four and alternated our resources during the game. Mattia Zaccagni did well, Toma Basic impressed off the bench.

“It’s disappointing to start with a defeat, because it becomes an uphill struggle, but we must look beyond the result and evaluate the performance.”

Having said that, Sarri does admit this Lazio is a very long way from his vision of football.

“I saw that some problems have not been resolved, we have issues with the timing and distances on passing channels, so we suffer in those situations. It’s a matter of centimetres and seconds, but they do ultimately make the difference.

“I saw progress from the Milan defeat, as we were much tighter, intercepted the ball between the lines more and allowed fewer counter-attacks. We need to improve our attacking movements, moving without the ball, but I still saw steps forward and cannot let our judgment be swayed by a fortuitous result.”