Gian Piero Gasperini ‘did not expect’ Napoli to change their tactics for Atalanta and explains why he made certain choices in the Coppa Italia semi-final.
The first leg ended 0-0 at the Stadio Diego Armando Maradona, but La Dea had the best scoring opportunities, forcing saves from David Ospina and missing a great chance with Rafael Toloi.
Gian Piero Gasperini ‘did not expect’ Napoli to change their tactics for Atalanta and explains why he made certain choices in the Coppa Italia semi-final.
The first leg ended 0-0 at the Stadio Diego Armando Maradona, but La Dea had the best scoring opportunities, forcing saves from David Ospina and missing a great chance with Rafael Toloi.
“It was a good performance. Clearly, Napoli are a quality squad, and we had most of the chances in the first half, while the tempo of the game was a little choppy in the second. We’re satisfied,” Gasp told RAI Sport.
“We’re under pressure in every competition, it’s not easy to always be in the right shape, but Napoli are in a similar situation. We’ll reset and be ready for the second leg.”
Gennaro Gattuso pulled a surprise by moving Napoli to a 3-4-3 formation from the start.
“We saw at a certain point against Parma last week that Napoli moved to three at the back. I didn’t expect them to start that way tonight, I will admit that, but we adjusted well.”
Gasperini also made some changes, for example leaving Josip Ilicic on the bench in favour of Colombian pair Duvan Zapata and Luis Muriel together.
“It’s not easy for a player like him to always have the right approach. He did well coming off the bench today and will be a very valuable asset for the second leg.
“Muriel is in great shape and he proved that again tonight. We play every three days and have done basically since January 3. We need everyone and have to alternate them, as that’s how we’ve managed to be fairly consistent in our performances so far.
“We had the chances today, the important thing of course is putting it in the net.”
Toloi was the most dangerous Atalanta player for the first half, prodding a great chance wide and getting into regular promising positions.
“He had some good spaces to run into, and we know he times his forward runs very well, and perhaps he had the clearest scoring opportunity of the whole game.”