Thiago Motta admits ‘this has been a fantastic week for Bologna’ after beating Roma, Inter and Atalanta, but warns they are ‘not even halfway through the season.’
The Rossoblu really do seem unstoppable at the moment, as after knocking holders Inter out of the Coppa Italia midweek in extra time, they still had energy left to beat Atalanta with a late Lewis Ferguson header on Riccardo Orsolini’s corner.
“Atalanta are a great team, who for seven or eight years have competed with Milan, Juventus, Napoli for the top spots. If you let them play, they will take control, have physicality, technique, organisation,” the coach told Sky Sport Italia.
They are the form team in Italy right now, having defeated Roma 2-0 in Serie A, then coming back from a goal down to knock Inter out of the Coppa Italia in extra time on Wednesday, followed by this 1-0 result against Atalanta.
“I think this has been a fantastic week for Bologna, as we beat Roma, after two days we played 120 minutes at San Siro and won. We returned home at 4am, then a couple of days later played again. These lads have fantastic spirit, it was so difficult to win this match today, but they interpreted the situations very well.
“At times, the dynamics of the game were going towards Atalanta too much, we made a few changes over half-time and the match was far more balanced from then on. They tried to make the most of our errors, we ran some risks with Lookman on the counter-attack, but my lads believed and fought to the end, so overall deserved the victory because of that spirit.
“I can only praise my players, as they were fantastic yet again.”
It not only consolidated fourth place, but took them closer to Milan in third, who were yesterday held to a 2-2 draw by Salernitana.
“It is a good moment for Bologna, but from tomorrow that is in the past and we can only focus on the present. That means first of all resting over Christmas with our families, the lads deserved that, and then we can prepare in the best way for the trip to Udine.
“We are not even halfway through the season, there’s no point making suggestions about what could happen. We just have to keep working the way we are now.”
Thiago Motta was also asked about some of the tactical tweaks that surprised Atalanta, as Riccardo Calafiori regularly cut inside from the left, while Jhon Lucumi was tracking Teun Koopmeiners.
“My players have this tactical intelligence, so they can look at each other and understand which is the right moment to go where. They had this freedom to move around, still respecting our organisation, and they did it very well.”