Monchi: ‘Di Francesco ruled Barcelona’

11 apr 2018

Roma director of football Monchi talked to Roma TV after the giallorossi’s incredible 3-0 win against Barcelona. “I’ve only slept four hours. I went to sleep at 3 am and I woke up at 7 am to go to the gym. I still don’t know how many messages I received, surely more than 300. It’s always nice when people text you, means they think about you.”

“I played the game 200 times in my mind. I knew we would have had some chances if we scored one goal in the first half conceding none. Then if we scored the second one, the third would come as a consequence. The fans were amazing, Barcelona were struggling but when De Rossi scored from the spot I thought we could have done it.”
“Roma were better than Barcelona. They have Suarez, Rakitic, Iniesta and Messi and they can hurt you anytime. We had positive feelings, Alisson didn’t make one single save.”

“It was Di Francesco’s win. I talked to him after yesterday's training and he told me that the lads were ready. He said he would have swapped system to give more physical strength. He wanted to try something different and it’s hard. He did something that could seem strange before the game but he was sure of what he was doing. He knew it before, our manager is a strong one.”