Hi, Ruud, congratulations. How do you assess that performance because the first half didn’t look the best, but Amad has, kind of, come up with two goals to win you the game?
“First half wasn’t good, that’s clear, a very good point. I think we created hardly anything and PAOK neither, they didn’t create a lot, so in that sense, we were okay. But we didn’t get going. I think our possession wasn’t good enough, we made many tactical mistakes, our shape wasn’t good, it was, at times, not low enough and, every time, in that shape that we wanted to play. Second half, we were a lot better, we persisted in finding Casemiro and [Manuel] Ugarte in front of the defence, or Amad and Bruno [Fernandes] in the no.10 positions and that’s why we started playing better and creating more chances and getting the better of the game, playing in their half more. And as you said, Amad made the difference there with two good goals.”
Ruud, you described this as a ‘big period’ for the club, can you explain what you mean by that? And I wonder how you assess what you’ve done so far in terms of steadying the ship before handing over?
“Well, I think every game is important in this season and that’s why I said the short spell of four games is an important period to react, especially when we lost against West Ham. Of course, we needed to start getting results, that’s why I said that was important. Other than that, your other question was how I assess the…”
What you’ve done so far in terms of steadying the ship, before Amorim…
“Yeah. For me, it’s important now to carry on and build on results of Leicester, of Chelsea, and of PAOK. I think this second half, we can build on, the result, we can build on; our first European home win after one year. We addressed that in the dressing room and it was time to change that, you know, so we did, the players did very well doing so. And Sunday is a big game for us in the league to get a good performance in again.”
