Legia.Net – Legia Warszawa – Chislau Michenewicz: There were some pluses in our game

– From my point of view, until almost 80 minutes we were in the game the whole time, the score was kept without goals. Maybe we didn’t create many chances, it was Napoli who created more, which – fortunately for us – they didn’t take advantage of. At the best moment, when the event started, we were conceded by two goals. The first – after a counterattack, after our situation that should have been better resolved, we were then able to take the initiative. Then we built another procedure after which we can parity. We immediately conceded the second goal. Our situation has become very difficult. The third kick was a great shot from the Napoli player, so we lost hope for a good result for 10 minutes.

I would like to thank the team for their tremendous efforts and commitment and leaving so much health on the pitch. The score does not reflect what was happening 80 minutes ago, because the last 10 minutes were crucial. Sometimes major changes are important. The entrances of Osimhen and Ruiz accelerated the Napoli match. We’ve seen that if the opponents’ score doesn’t match, at some point there will be substitutes on the pitch playing in the regular line-up – and that’s how it was. When we lost our power, we made changes, and so did our opponents. Their rotation turned out to be decisive. Two of our players who helped us earlier – Emreli and Castrate – were involved in two situations where we were able to score. That did not happen.

We go back to Warsaw sad. I think when the feelings subside, you can see that there are some positives in our game. In addition to commitment and organization, there were also some good elements. We competed with a great team, the captain of the Italian Serie A, which we tried to oppose.

– The loss of goals immediately after our actions .. It stuck in my memory. Until then, everything was fine – we didn’t score, but we didn’t concede either. It was an essential part of the meeting for us. If you conceded a goal when you managed to score it yourself, and then fail to defend the opponent, it will be a great resentment and pain. We knew that when we conceded first, it would be difficult for us to answer. However, we had a 1-1, after which we conceded a goal again. I think these two moments hurt more than ever and sit in the players’ minds, because I’ve had the opportunity to talk to some of them. Apart from a short conversation with everyone, everyone regrets these two cases (Emreli and Kastrati – ed.). We knew there wouldn’t be many chances to score. We realized that we had to use everything that could be. We did not finalize the two most important goals, after which the opponent scored the goals, after the counter-attack, when there was a little more space. The changes turned out to be decisive. It’s hard to blame Osimhen’s actions because no one caught him. I don’t think there are many defenders in Europe to catch up with him in this situation.

– We knew we wanted to avoid direct duels between Manolas and Koulibaly – because of their sport – with our attackers. We were looking for a different solution, a way to avoid it. I think the idea with Ernst Mossi as the lying ten, who also goes down to midfield, was good. I regret a lot, because in the first half there was a good situation, where he broke free in the penalty area, tried to shoot – there was a corner kick. Filip Mladenovic was in a great position, it was possible to play optimally. We knew there wouldn’t be a lot of opportunities to be in the penalty area, that there would be dash, jumps after interceptions. And that you have to have good, fast, technically advanced players who are good at football. The idea was to put as many players who can handle the ball under pressure as possible in a small space. We knew there wouldn’t be much space and we had to keep it in the game after we caught the ball. There were better and worse moments.

During the break we told ourselves we had to keep the ball in play longer and with more courage. Of course, there were also bugs where we tried to play backwards. Then we moved the game in a simpler way, with a long introduction from Czarek Miszta, because the previous balls did not reach the addressees. The way to play against Napoli, which is in good shape, was to play with two great ball players under a lot of pressure.