Sassuolo head coach Davide Ballardini has praised his side for the way they applied themselves during the 3-3 draw against AC Milan this afternoon.
Milan’s five-game winning run in Serie A was ended by Sassuolo today but they came back from two different two-goal deficits to snatch a point after a nightmare start to the game.
The Rossoneri were all at sea defensively in the opening stages, with Andrea Pinamonti opening the scoring and Armand Lauriente doubling the advantage for the home side.
Rafael Leao’s solo run got the Rossoneri back into it but then Lauriente restored the two-goal lead early in the second half to give Milan a mountain to climb.
Goals from Luka Jovic and Noah Okafor secured a point that still carries a bit of a bitter taste, though the result means that the gap to Juventus in third place remains six points.
Ballardini spoke in the conference room at the Mapei Stadium to try and make sense of what was a dramatic encounter, with his comments relayed by MilanNews.
Glass half full or half empty?
“We did well but then we dropped a bit, even if it’s clear that we were playing against engines with a large displacement. Milan took the match seriously. The performance was very good, against a great team. We care about the performance and the point, our thoughts turn to the next match: we are there and we want to play.”
Is there a psychological problem behind not being able to keep leads?
“With Toljan’s injury we used up a substitution straight away, it’s a further difficulty. We need to be better in training at asking for attention and not letting others play in our half of the pitch. If we can be more aggressive on the ball carrier maybe we can avoid complications.
“We dropped a lot in the last 25 minutes. Today we had a four-on-two break and we could close the game, but instead we lost the ball and the other team make it 3-2. You lose serenity and confidence, we were playing against an extraordinarily strong team.”
Do the goals conceded against Salernitana or those by Milan weigh more today?
“In Salerno the goals conceded are solely our responsibility. It depends on us. If we are better, and we can be, we will come away with more satisfactions. And instead, if we are not better, it means that we deserve to concede goals. We have all the qualities to do even better.”
Why didn’t Bajrami come on?
“In place of Bajrami we put Henrique. By putting him in we wanted to have more presence in midfield. Bajrami maybe gives you a big hand in attack but in the defensive phase he has less presence.”
It’s not that Milan was that strong. It’s sas def who is total cráp. Puli and chuck managed to get space and pass into the box over 3 players covering the space. Or should i say not covering it..
They almost made it 4-1 which would have been psychologically a knock out blow for us. They had a 4 on 2 break and passed wrongly at the end. We were lucky. The 3-2 knocked them back instead. Such is the game of football
Sassuolos defence was among the worst I’ve ever seen in Italy. On par with Manchester United 😅