Real Madrid Coach Santiago Solari explained his surprising Isco snub against Roma and their first half struggles. “Games are 90 minutes long for a reason.”

Julen Lopetegui was in charge when Real Madrid beat Roma 3-0 at the Bernabeu in September, but Solari made clear this evening he was no caretaker by surprisingly leaving Isco in the stands for a 2-0 victory.

Real Madrid Coach Santiago Solari explained his surprising Isco snub against Roma and their first half struggles. “Games are 90 minutes long for a reason.”

Julen Lopetegui was in charge when Real Madrid beat Roma 3-0 at the Bernabeu in September, but Solari made clear this evening he was no caretaker by surprisingly leaving Isco in the stands for a 2-0 victory.

“Dropping Isco was a specific decision for a specific moment. Coaches are in place to make decisions and that’s it,” he told Movistar+ Liga de Campeones.

“Decisions are almost always sporting, except in exceptional cases, although there are none of those here.

“Starters and substitutes are fictitious problems that don’t exist. The players are here to give everything and be at 100 percent so they can be picked.”

Roma dominated the first half and wasted numerous scoring opportunities, but then gifted Gareth Bale the opener with an awful Federico Fazio back-pass.

“I would say that I preferred the seriousness in our play to the goals we scored. We worked hard and you almost always have to win by playing like we did.

“Games are 90 minutes long for a reason. Sometimes you have to be patient and we were tonight. Everyone showed a sense of responsibility.

“Playing Marco Llorente was a decision I made and I’m here to make decisions. Sometimes we make the right ones, sometimes we don’t, but it’s easy to say that after the game.

“I’m very happy with how he played. He’s very disciplined and he works very well. He’s a young man now and not a kid anymore. We’re all very happy for him.

“Lucas Vazquez’s performance was no surprise. He’s a hard-worker on the wings and tonight he scored. He did a spectacular job defensively.”

The state of the Stadio Olimpico pitch was a problem, as it was used for rugby on Saturday, then Lazio played Milan here on Sunday. There has also been very heavy rain in the Capital for several days.

“As for the turf, it was pretty bad.”

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Tickets Kit Collector