Sarri: ‘Hope Ounas not serious’

Maurizio Sarri hopes the Adam Ounas injury “is less serious than it looked,” but criticised Napoli substitutes for their 2-1 defeat to Atletico Madrid.

Arkadiusz Milik saw a penalty parried by Jan Oblak and Jose Callejon’s volley opened the scoring, but late on Fernando Torres and Lucas Vietto turned it around.

In the final minute, Diego Godin was sent off for two shocking tackles, wiping out Ounas on the touchline.

Maurizio Sarri hopes the Adam Ounas injury “is less serious than it looked,” but criticised Napoli substitutes for their 2-1 defeat to Atletico Madrid.

Arkadiusz Milik saw a penalty parried by Jan Oblak and Jose Callejon’s volley opened the scoring, but late on Fernando Torres and Lucas Vietto turned it around.

In the final minute, Diego Godin was sent off for two shocking tackles, wiping out Ounas on the touchline.

“We hope the Ounas injury is less serious than it looked initially, as that would be a problem,” said the Coach in his Press conference.

“Tomorrow he will have tests. Godin could’ve avoided a challenge like that, but this Atletico side is accustomed to playing like that, so it’s understandable. Let’s not blame him too much.

“We certainly need to gain more experience, but today we needed to play with a different temperature. We managed to do pretty well for 65 minutes and I am a bit angry, because I expected more from those who came off the bench.

“It’s only right that teams play in friendlies the way they would in a ‘real’ game, because otherwise they won’t get match fitness. We did really well for an hour, but unable to lift the tempo, we had to limit ourselves. If we had more energy in our legs, we could’ve done better, especially as Atletico are one of the best teams in Europe when they defend deep.

“As I said, I expected more from those who came on in the final half-hour.”

The new season begins and Napoli still have problems conceding on corners.

“We can work on it, but it’s a matter of physical characteristics and it could be damaging in Europe. It’s not like I can stretch the players to make them taller…”