On the eve of the Super Cup semi-final against Milan, the Azzurri coach approves of the Arab format: “The more the club travels abroad, the more you make yourself known: I hope to stay here until next Monday…”
Antonio Conte had an extra hour to think about the title to give in the press room on the eve of tomorrow’s Super Cup semifinal against Milan. Napoli, who arrived last night, showed up at King Saud an hour later than planned. Traffic was also to blame, a daily thorn in the side of seven million inhabitants. The Azzurri coach is keen to put the defeat against Udinese behind him: “During the year, there are more positive situations and others that are less so. We had five wins under our belt, then we lost in the Champions League and Serie A, but what matters is to continue working with seriousness, desire, and a lot of enthusiasm. Everything always comes down to hard work.”
On Lukaku’s return to the group: “He doesn’t have any minutes in his legs, we have to be good and have the patience to wait for him. The fact that he’s back this week is a positive thing, we’re talking about an experienced and quality player, like Di Lorenzo and others. It’s an important return for us. Now we have to wait for him, do some physical tests to understand when he can return without the slightest danger.” On the Super Cup format: “It’s a great experience. For me, it’s the first time I’ve played in the semifinals and final outside Italy, so we want to enjoy it. We hope to extend our stay here until Monday. Finding Napoli fans here is great. The more the club travels abroad, the more you make yourself known. Fans are attracted by victories, so we will try to be attractive from this point of view. We have found people asking us for autographs and photos here too.“ On tomorrow’s opponents Milan: ”They are a great team and we want to test ourselves in these kinds of games. This is the level we want to stay at. Playing for a trophy must be an important emotional boost.” . Conte also spoke about the return of Lobotka, who played for half an hour against Udinese: “The problem he had wasn’t serious,” said Conte, “now he’s ready. It doesn’t change much for us because we still have two true midfielders, him and McTominay. Elmas is intelligent and knows how to adapt, but it’s inevitable that there are characteristics to be respected. For now, we’ll continue like this.”
talks about lorenzo— Captain Di Lorenzo was also present in the press room: “We want to play on equal terms and reach the final in regular time; that’s the goal. We’re ready, we’ll be facing a strong team and we know it. We’re fully focused. We want to give this trophy our all. Tomorrow’s match will also depend a lot on how we defend ourselves; that will be important.”
