thohir

Erick Thohir reflected on Roberto Mancini’s first year and a bit in the Nerazzurri dugout, Inter’s start to the season and the club’s future targets in an interview with Indonesian daily TopSkor.

“If we look back to November 2014, we had to make the best choice for Inter and there could be no better choice than Roberto Mancini. He’s a successful coach who has achieved great results with Inter in the past and knows the Italian league well,” the Nerazzurri president began.

“We’ve discussed our plans for Inter with Mancini from day one. We want to get back in Europe and be playing in the Champions League again. Roberto Mancini is the sort of coach who is always hungry for success. He’s also brave enough to change tactics or formations during a match – something lots of coaches aren’t able to do.

“If Inter have been able to get themselves in the position they’re in now, it’s down to the good team work done by Mancini and the management, having a clear strategy and the talent and flexibility of our players.”

“We’re pleased with what we’ve done so far but when I say pleased that doesn’t mean we’re not going to keep improving – we can and we want to do that. We should be among the top ten clubs in the world and to get there we have to be in the Champions League. The results are good now. Ever since the start of the season we’ve said that our target was to qualify for the Champions League but we were top until the last game.

“We have to give credit to Sassuolo because they played well in the last game. We had lots of chances but didn’t take them and in the end it was a bad result. In any case I think we’ll pick ourselves up thanks to the players’ determination to bounce back and Mancini’s leadership skills.

“We have to get ahead of our rivals. Roma have changed coach and other clubs will improve their teams so that’s further motivation for us to work hard and keep improving ourselves.”