Luciano Spalletti admits Roma have issues after a 4-2 Europa League defeat to Olympique Lyonnais. “When things go wrong, we don’t have the character to fight back.”
Mouctar Diakhaby had given the hosts the lead, then Mohamed Salah and Federico Fazio turned it around, but Lyon took control in the second half with three goals.
Luciano Spalletti admits Roma have issues after a 4-2 Europa League defeat to Olympique Lyonnais. “When things go wrong, we don’t have the character to fight back.”
Mouctar Diakhaby had given the hosts the lead, then Mohamed Salah and Federico Fazio turned it around, but Lyon took control in the second half with three goals.
“They have this quality, youth and sparkling approach. We had to take the possession off them, as if they have the ball, they can find spaces between the lines or shoot from distance,” the Coach told Sky Sport Italia.
“These are our characteristics. When things go well and are precise, we can soar. When things go wrong, we don’t have the character to fight back and our players in general have a calmer temperament.
“I expected us to do more with our quality, because if we can’t use our strengths then it becomes difficult to cover our weaknesses.
“We had the chances to finish Lyon off or score more goals here. We probably had more potential attacking moves compared to Lyon, but they ended up coming to nothing.
“We had the ball in the box so often, for example that time Emerson Palmieri went past his man, waited for four or five seconds and in the end we didn’t even get a shot away in that move.
“I expect it to be difficult in the second leg, as Lyon are good on the counter and we didn’t allow them that many of those opportunities today. We tried to pack the midfield and that is where they caused us a few problems.
“I had hoped with the substitutions to take some of the pressure off us, but instead we conceded a fourth as well.”
Roma conceded within 80 seconds of the restart at the Stade de Lyon with Corentin Tolisso.
“I expected in the second half that we would control the tempo, but we conceded the goal straight away when we had two extra defenders in that area and just waited for them.
“At times we controlled it well, but we were never determined enough in attack and didn’t make the most of the times we did pin them back into their own final third. We had many potential chances and crosses into the box, but didn’t finish them.
“We got a bit stretched out and our first touch was poor, for example that chance that Edin Dzeko had to go clear. We got tired towards the end.”
Spalletti seemed depressed in his post-match interview and visibly deflated by their downturn in fortunes.
“It’s good to be mature and know how to control the situation, reading the moment, but it’s not easy in the game situation to keep those distances accurate.
“I don’t think the team did that badly. We failed to make the most of our chances and we were too slow on the counter.”
Roma have now lost three games in a row between Serie A and the Europa League, including a head-to-head with Napoli. Are the Giallorossi seeing their season fall apart?
“We have an important name and past on our shoulders and sometimes situations are remembered, as they are hard to break away from. I still think we have the chance to turn the situation around. We have to talk to each other clearly, modify things and do more than we have done.
“We could say this is fine, we are mature and strong, but we have to dig deeper and do more.”