"Real Madrid deserved the victory"

Atalanta coach Gian Piero Gasperini felt that Real Madrid deserved to win the European Super Cup at the National Stadium in Warsaw, although he felt they would have had a better chance if they had taken the lead. “The match had many ingredients, Real Madrid deserved to win. What we're left with is that there was a moment when we could have swung the game our way and we didn't manage it,” he told a press conference.

“We had the feeling that we could cause Madrid problems if we managed to express ourselves as we did for long stretches of the match. We had confidence in that, but it's fundamental to be clinical and be able to score the goal. If we had managed to take the lead, we would have had a much better chance. I regret not being able to score first,” he said.

In that sense, he considered that Mario Pasalic's header that Madrid goalkeeper Thibaut Courtois parried out and another later chance by Nigerian Ademola Lookman could have given them that positive result: “We had played the game we wanted to play. In this type of game, it's too important to take the lead. Real Madrid always has the chance to turn around a game that, up to that point, we had been doing well.”

On the other hand, he thanked the fans in the stands for their support: “We already know that they follow us everywhere in Europe and support us a lot. At some point in this match, we had the opportunity to give them a joy, even to the neutrals. Everyone cheered us on, in general, it was a great game, with a great crowd in a great stadium, with lots of fans. It was a great night for European football.

 

August 14, 2024