“The truth is that I did not properly prepare my players for this game, it is my fault.” Those are the words of Luciano Spalletti following Inter’s defeat to Sion in their second preseason friendly, taking full responsibility and clarifying that the defeat was due to poor fitness in comparison to their opposition.
The coach then continued by saying: “We have been working very hard in training; even yesterday (Tuesday) the session was very tiring. Of course, losing is never a nice feeling but it’s part of the job and it’s a risk you run with these games.
“The pitch was poor as well. The ball was travelling slowly, due to the density of the grass which does not allow for quick play,” as reported by Gazzetta dello Sport.
Did Nainggolan’s injury affect the team’s performance?
“Radja is Radja, his quality is there for all to see and he has a very recognisable style, but when he doesn’t play things need to be better than they were today. He asked to be substituted very early on; this was also a result of our work at Appiano.”
Dalbert on the right?
“It was an experiment which will be repeated. He still has work to do but I want to give him continuity. When we play Zenit we will try it again, because he can play on both sides but he needs to believe it. It is true that there were more negatives than positives but he’ll take this lesson”.
Why didn’t Icardi start?
“He is even further behind his teammates in training, but at the same time, he needed some minutes”.
Where was the three man defence?
“I’ve said that I want to work with a three-man defence, but for what I wanted to try against Sion, the 4-2-3-1 was the better choice. We will start working on the three-man defence before we play Zenit”.
