Inter Coach Antonio Conte: “I Want To Thank Romelu Lukaku

Inter coach Antonio Conte spoke to Italian media outlet InterTV following the Nerazzurri’s 1-0 victory last night over Udinese in the Serie A at home at the Stadio Giuseppe Meazza.
“I was aware of the difficulties of the game: Udinese are a physical team, with strong players, good at restarts. We’ve had a lot of difficulties in the one-on-one game, but we’ve faced this challenge in the right way and with the right attitude.”

“We worked on an alternative to our 3-5-2. I’m happy because having an alternative to a game system is very important. Even during the game, you can become much more offensive with three pure strikers. Today we played with two trequartisti, Politano and Sensi. The team is storing knowledge, enriching and expanding their football brains. This is very important, I’m happy.”
The coach then spoke of his players and their performance in the victory.
“Romelu had a problem during the warm-up, in his back. So, first of all, I’d like to thank him because he played and gave everything he had. Clearly his performance wasn’t very brilliant. But he had this problem, at the same time, when the players return from the national team it’s not easy, because you interrupt a job for 15 days and you have to get back into it.”
“I’m happy for Lautaro, who has played from the start: he’s growing up, he’s doing great things, he must continue like this. Barella had already been booked and I wanted to have zero risks. I am very happy with Gagliardini’s performance.”
“We have to grow, we have to suffer, we have to fight. But let’s still enjoy these three victories, because they happened against teams that on paper seemed simple, but you still have to win: I think we did it in a well-deserved way. We could have closed the game earlier, but we kept it open and also gave Lasagna a chance. Now my head is shaking, there’s work to be done on Tuesday.”
Finally, Conte spoke of the team’s momentum heading towards their Champions League game next week against Slavia Prague.
“Winning gives you confidence, awareness, enthusiasm… It makes you realise that you’re on the right team, because we’ve won three games deservedly in which no one has given us anything. Then, if you want to look at the glass half full, you can see that we have suffered these games. But the suffering strengthens us: we have to grow; we have to grow in many different ways. We have to close out the games first, so I’ll stay calm and then I can get to the end of the season