Zinedine Zidane faced the media shortly after our home defeat against Deportivo Alavés (1-2). The coach spoke about the match, provided some news on Hazard’s injury, and what the problem is with the team.
Read a full transcript of the managers press conference below:
THE MATCH:
“I have no explanation for tonight. We’ve had good and bad moments in games like today’s. Especially at the beginning, when they scored a goal after three minutes. We had time to get back into the game and then things got very tough for us and it became difficult. Just like the other day in Milan, we played a good game today, but three days later, it’s tough to play a game like this at home, but that’s the reality of today. What we’re going to do is keep working, trying to get all the players back and then change the dynamics. We don’t have the consistency in our matches or in our results.
THE PROBLEM?
“At the moment it’s the problem we have: the consistency. We have had a lot of problems with injuries. But we’re not going to make excuses, it is what it is. We have to change the dynamic, it’s the only way. I can’t explain it. We’re going to analyze things as a group and then think about changing the dynamic. That’s all we can do and we play on Tuesday.
“It wasn’t a question of attitude, it wasn’t a question of football, because if you put in a performance like we did the other day, when we played really well, but tonight’s was the worst start we’ve made to a game all season. It’s true that it’s tough because we didn’t change or weren’t capable of changing the pattern of the game during the course of the match. That bothers me and the players too.”
HAZARD’S INJURY:
“I think and hope that Eden just took a knock, because it’s not muscular. That’s what he said.”
NO COMEBACK:
“That’s how it went today. That’s the reality. That was how this game panned out. We didn’t produce a comeback. We were a bit brighter after the goal at the end of the first half, but we came up short with what we produced in the second half. We did very little to alter the feel of things within the team. We have to forget tonight, move on and focus on Tuesday’s game.”
MESSAGE TO THE PLAYERS:
“We’ll now think about Tuesday. What I’ll say to the players remains between us. I’m responsible for all of this and it’s down to me to find a solution with them. That’s what we’ll be looking to do. We have to look at the things we did well and follow up on them and be more consistent in what we all do out there.”
