Mourinho: We deserved to win but didn't play well at the moment the team rankings look normal

Livestream, December 23 – After Roma's 1-1 draw with Sampdoria, Mourinho was interviewed after the game and argued that the team was not playing at its best.

Your team showed great patience and is it frustrating not to get three points?

I don't think we had that much patience, we didn't play very well and we should have won, yes because we did well in the second half, before we were tied 1-0 and 1-1. We tried and played very intensely, trying to win the game. The team controlled the game but didn't create too many chances. But it was an "ugly" game where the side that wanted to win didn't play well, and the side that didn't want to win didn't play well, but got a point reward.

After a great performance in Bergamo, was the team a little tired in this game?

Maybe, though it's normal in a way. Even Sampdoria have such a squad, and their coaches can choose between two different squads to play in, one of which can be chosen for each game. So it's possible that the players are tired, but, in the second half, it doesn't seem like that. In the first half, maybe so. In the first half, the team seemed a bit slow, lacked courage, they had a hard time finding the right angle to shoot, and when we got the ball, the players had a bit of a lack of attention and lost a lot of balls because of some stupid mistakes. Sometimes, if it's not a standard problem, it may be because of fatigue, so it may be that the players are a little tired. All in all, we deserved to win, but we didn't play well.

In the second half of the season, you don't want to see your players make any mistakes?

Before the game I told the team that you can play badly, you can win or lose, but there are some things that you should never lose once you pick them up, and we have courage and want to win against Atalanta, so today's regret is that I didn't see the same attitude. Maybe part of it is fatigue, which seems understandable to me. I'm always going to support the players, always be there for them, and I don't want to be too harsh on them. But we didn't play very well.

On the other hand, however, it is clear that we are facing a team that does not want to win very much, do not take this as a criticism of the opponent, but Sampdoria adopted their style and wasted time from the first minute, which they often do. It gave the team a sense of calm that it shouldn't have. Then, after 1-1, once again only one team tried to win the game, and all the opponents stayed behind the ball and were happy to get a point, well done.

Do you think your tactical arrangements will change when Lorenzo Pellegrini returns?

We'll see, and most importantly he'll be back. If all goes well during the break, of course I'm talking about the pandemic here, then I think only Spinazzolla hasn't played yet, and that will give us more options because we're a team that needs more content.

If you were asked to post a photo on Instagram to summarize the first half of the season, which one would you choose?

It's going to be a very ordinary picture because in my opinion it's a very ordinary league chart: Inter is leading, Milan is leading, Juve is leading, Napoli is leading, Atalanta is leading. So, this wouldn't be an amazing post with 1 million likes. This is normal because the current ranking seems normal to us.

（eagle）