It was an energetic Andrea Stramaccioni who was interviewed by Italian RAI after having watched Andrea Ranocchia secure Inter’s passage to the semifinals of the Coppa Italia by heading home a last minute of extra time corner making it 3-2 at the San Siro against Bologna: “It was a game that felt over when Palacio scored 2-0 but this is the beauty of football. We were unlucky when Diamanti got a free-kick and then we were down to ten men since Cassano was feeling a bit of pain. It is a match that further demonstrates the strength in this group even though I want to compliment Bologna for how they played the game. To concede two goals in 4 minutes would have knocked anyone out but we gave a good performance since we didn’t lose our heads, got back into the game and I can say that we fully deserved to go through, we all value the Coppa Italia: me, the players, the President, everyone.”
Shortly after he was interviewed by Inter Channel: “Right now I’m only thinking about the match that we won in the 120th minute – he says laughing – the best thing to see is how we approach the Coppa Italia, tonight’s match was a great one, spectacular finish. We hade the match in our hands, we were 2-0 up with only 10 minutes remaining of the match. Diamanti’s freekick broke the inertia of the match, during their the second goal we were far to naive in our defending and that completely changed the direction of the game. Cassano got injured and they put the pedal to the metal but in the end it all ended well. Koné’s substitution together with the three strikers up front created a lot of difficulties for us considering we played with a 3-man defence so thats why we converted to a 4-4-2 and then we were able to get back in to the game and even with 10 men we deserved to win the match.”
Then Stramaccioni was asked how he views the two potential semi-final opponents, Roma and Fiorentina: “Irrespective of which team becomes the fourth team in the semifinal it will be a team from the top tier of the league. It will be a top 4 play-off of sorts, but right now I’m only thinking of Roma, there are those who aren’t feeling too good and we have to understand their situations. Tonight we controlled the game well, then came Diamanti’s free-kick, for us this was never a free-kick and for Alessandro these are almost like penalty-kick’s. We became a bit inertial but the 2-2 goal was completely due to a mistake on our part. The team reacted really well despite this.”
He was also asked to comment on the injury situation: “Cassano isn’t in a good condition, but we hope to be able to recuperate him for Sunday. Nagatomo? He was examined tonight, tomorrow we will know everything, we hope to have him against Roma. Milito’s injury worse than first suspected? He has a problem with his knee and we have to look into it to 101% because he is very important. I agree with our doctor, I don’t wan’t to risk anything.”
In conclusion Stramaccioni was asked on Marco Benassi’s performance who once more found himself in the starting line-up: “In my opinion Marco played a very good first half, the substitution was planned. We didn’t suffer in the middle of the pitch but more on the wings and with Koné and Gabbiadini they were able to gain even more out there. Zanetti, Guarin, Cambiasso and Benassi played either way a very good match. How is Pereira doing? It was the second time he felt a blow to his face but he is a fighter and a warrior. He will go through a small operation in the nose-area to adjust this problem but he is filled with the Inter-spirit, he never gives up.”
