FC Porto have never won in England and hope to do so for the first time this Thursday, October 22nd, when they visit Nottingham Forest in the 3rd round of the Europa League league stage.
Coach Francesco Farioli says it is not possible to compete against the money that English teams have to invest, but he believes he can fight them with other arguments.
“We are talking about a championship that in the last 10 years has gained the possibility of investing by a long distance. This attracts the best players and that is enough to create a big gap with other competitions. Furthermore, we cannot fight for money or budget, where we can fight is to show up with a good spirit and mentality, as a group, with desire and humility, especially when things are going well. It will be a game full of challenges and duels, of contact, we need to compete with them in this area so we can take the game where we want it”said the Italian coach in a press conference.
Farioli considers that “playing in Europe requires other things than playing in the League, the level of competition increases” and confessed that he had difficulties in preparing for this Thursday’s game taking into account the recent change in the technical command of the English team: Ange Postecoglou left, Sean Dyche entered.
“On Saturday we received the news and we ended up throwing away the work that the analysis department had done on the previous manager and prepared the three favorite candidates. From Tuesday onwards we focused our attention on the new manager, who has a strong connection with the club and the game will have an emotional factor that will impact the game. He has a clear identity. I used to use video clips from when he trained at Burnley for the team spirit and the the way they defended. There are factors and scenarios that we analyzed and others that we will discover tomorrow”he added.
The FC Porto coach is also suspicious of the troubled moment that Nottingham Forest is going through: “That’s part of football, the dynamics change very quickly, we can’t pay too much attention to that. We know the value of the club, they were in the top four of the Premier League for much of last season and this summer they spent more than 200 million euros on transfers, so they added quality to what they already had. Furthermore, this season they changed coach three times, three great coaches, they all combined their vision of football. And the Sean Dyche will bring a great bond with the club and the city, he is from Nottingham. It will be a game in which, football and emotionally, it will require a lot of attention from us. We have to get on the field to compete.”
Farioli also praised Polish central defender Bednarek, from whom he already had “good feedback as a group leader”. “I found a very special player for several reasons. What he does, on and off the field, is absolutely remarkable, he arrived with a lot of respect from everyone, he sets the bar very high in terms of work, it is no coincidence what we are doing. His help has been very important since day one”he emphasized.
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