Challenge: “As I said, I am aware of the club’s current situation. My concern at the moment is to get to know the players in depth. One thing is what we see, another is to work with them on a daily basis. I am very concerned with progressing the team, improving. Obviously with my ideas. And I’m not saying that they are better or worse than those of Mister Rui Borges, they are different. I am totally committed to making the players understand what I want them to do. I believe that this will lead us to be a stronger team. And one that can enter every game with a single objective: to win.”
Right time to come to the club: “It’s difficult to say no when we have the possibility of making a dream come true. And I felt, as I said, that this was the ideal moment. It’s the moment in which I feel most prepared to live up to the demands of a club like Sporting. Naturally, people in Portugal remember a lot about my journey here. I went abroad with the clear ambition of progressing and evolving. I was concerned about being in the best championships, although, and I confess, I had many invitations to Saudi, to Brazil… But my goal has always been to stay in the top five to prepare for this moment. And the truth is, naturally, I know that not everyone follows the championships out there. People probably don’t know the Paulo Fonseca of today. And this one is different, I think for the better.
Sporting squad: “If I didn’t believe, I wouldn’t be here. And one of the things that motivated me was the young quality of this squad. I think we have a bright future ahead of us. It will require a lot of dedication, but I fully believe in the squad. Today I already had the opportunity to carry out the first training session. And if I was already excited, today I was much more so. I fully believe that we will be stronger. Many of them are young, there are many who are in Portugal for the first time. And this change is not easy. They come from other contexts. But time will demonstrate that the choices were agreed and that this squad provides guarantees for the future of our club.”
Lot of captains: “I’m a coach who believes that leaders should be references in the squads. I need time to get to know the players and decide based on that knowledge whether there is a need (to change) or not.”
Year zero: “The demands at Sporting are always maximum. There are nine points. I believe that in football nothing is impossible. I am more focused on the process, team evolution, responses to our ideas and proposals. The time to train is not much. We will try, as best we can, to prepare the team to be ambitious next Saturday.”
What has changed in recent years: “If we are open to it, experiences make us evolve. The game has changed a lot in recent years. There have been transformations in the game itself. I went through championships that forced me to change my vision of what the game and training are. Therefore, due to the different experiences, I felt that I changed a lot. On a personal level, I have two more children than I had at the time, I have four and that forces us to have more responsibility. When we start our careers, we think we know everything. A coach is an unfinished process. We have to be constantly updating.”
System at Sporting: “There is a lot of talk about systems, I believe more in structures. Teams have flexibility. I’m not worried about the structure at the moment, it changes depending on the moment of the game. I’m worried about other things, with teaching our game principles and that’s what I’m going to focus on. I don’t think that, at the moment, it could be an option, according to my ideas, to continue the last game, which is to play with three central players. I’m not a big fan of the line of five but, in certain moments of the game, I can be.”
Conversation with Rui Borges: “There was a phone call when the news started to come out. Yesterday I had the pleasure of speaking with him, an open and honest conversation. They are two coaches who understand these moments. I spent a lot of time talking to Rui, a pleasant and admirable conversation. I didn’t just speak to Rui, I also spoke to Tiago, who is his assistant and I’ve known for a long time. Sometimes problems arise in normal things. I can tell you a story. I was at Milan, playing a game with Roma, and the coach came to me To succeed, I was already hired. The next day I had to take things out of my locker in a hurry because the new coach wanted to come in. I didn’t get a call after that. I didn’t take it the wrong way.
