‘Cholo’ Simeone: “The referee interpreted the same as Pubill because it is common sense”

The coach of Atlético de Madrid, Diego Pablo Simeone, has stated that referee István Kovács “interpreted the same thing” as Marc Pubill “because it is common sense”, in the play of the possible penalty not awarded to the Colchonero defender during the first leg of the quarterfinals in the Champions League against FC Barcelona, ​​which ended with a 0-2 against the culés.

“We defended in an orderly manner, we defended by doing a good job so that they could not progress in their attack, which we always say: it is very good; of the last 23 games, they had won 22 and with goals in all the games. I think that we could not, except in the first 15 minutes when we had two or three good plays in attack with progression, have more plays than we would have liked to have due to their merit, of taking time to be able to play,” the ‘Cholo’ began his press conference.

“And the play we were looking for appeared. Julián sees Giuliano, Giuliano breaks well… The truth is that I am far from where the play appears and there is a control that takes it to go hand in hand with the goalkeeper and apparently the foul comes, and the VAR already calls the referee to confirm the expulsion. From there, an incredible goal from Julián,” he described.

“In the second half, I think they started more looking to counterpunch than to attack positionally as they usually do. As the minutes went by, they looked for that 2 to 1, putting more people offensively to see if the result could be shorter. And we always coexisted between defending that 1 to 0, later the 2 to 0, and not defining ourselves for the 3 to 0 and ensuring that 2 to 0, which is not easy to be at that moment. I think they were able to have the calm to bring a result home well,” he referred to his pupils. “We know the difficulty we are going to encounter next Tuesday and we are prepared to compete,” he added.

Then Simeone reflected on the impact these games have left on him. “The truth is that I am rarely totally happy, I always find something to not enjoy what we are actually doing. But I put myself in their shoes playing and I know the difficulty of playing here, I know the difficulty that appears and I understand that the team looked for, as I just explained, all the ways to win, from the forcefulness that many times we cannot sustain, and today we had it 100%,” he explained.

In addition, he was asked about the expulsion of center back Pau Cubarsí and about that penalty not awarded to Pubill after touching the ball with his hand when it seemed that Juan Musso had already put it into play on a goal kick. “If it was far from Giuliano’s, Musso’s was even further away. What there is is common sense,” ‘Cholo’ began his argument.

“If Marc, who was receiving a supposed pass to start the play, interpreted what he interpreted and the referee interpreted the same thing that Marc interpreted, it is because it is only common sense of the game. Then we can look for all the situations we want to obviously give our opinion,” the Colchonero coach simply answered.

Meanwhile, he was blunt when asked if his team will be the favorite in the second leg: “No, because we know that we are facing a very strong rival. We have the humility to say this, that they are very good and we are going to play a game with all the enthusiasm, with our people and with all the commitment to be able to continue in this competition that we love so much.”

“I like to be on the side of preparing the advantage because it is a matter of common sense. Then, it is normal that we already saw it after the 4-0, how well they have played and how well they have responded to a game at home. So we imagine a difficult game, we imagine a complex game; but we already said it, we do not look at who we have in front of us, we know that we have to pass,” stressed the Argentine Atleti coach.

Later he spoke about his first victory at the Camp Nou as the red and white coach. “I believe that there were several coaches who have not had to win; or there are very few, or rather, those who have had to win. I think that today we were very forceful and that makes me happy for the effort of the footballers. We have been doing important work for two years now, we changed many footballers,” he recalled about this project.

“It is not easy to transform and for the players to adapt to what this club has to do to position it where it has to be demanded. And obviously today we were able to confirm an important match and from humility know that we are going to have a tough match at home,” concluded the ‘Cholo’ in his wheel.