Olympiacos is due to host Freiburg on Thursday (15/9, 19:45, Cosmote TV, official TV partner of the “red-and-white” FC) for the 2nd round of the group-stage UEFA Europa League matches.
In view of the Europa League match between the “red-and-whites” and Freiburg, our team’s coach, Carlos Corberan, and team player Pep Biel spoke at the press conference.
Spanish footballer Pep Biel spoke first:
How prepared do you feel for such a demanding match and how optimistic are you regarding the team’s image so far?
The truth is, it’s been two weeks since my arrival and I feel good, but I think my team also feels the same way.
How do you expect the match to evolve against the second team of the German league, who seem determined to win? What’s the attitude of your team towards this game?
The truth is that we haven’t started out as well as they have, but we are Olympiacos and we possess worthy footballers; this is what we will prove tomorrow.
In the last series of games Olympiacos has had good intervals as well as dead intervals in the same games.
This can happen in soccer, there are minutes during which you perform well and some that you don’t. Surely, we want to have a lasting performance and extend our good intervals on the field and that’s what we are planning to do.
You’ve proven your worth; how much do you think you can improve? Additionally, a great footballer, Marcelo, has joined the team and we’re expecting one more. You’re from Spain, so we would like your opinion and how you players deal with the signing of such footballers on the team.
I always try to improve and present my best self. There is always room for improvement and I will continue to strive for the best. When you welcome players of such high standard in the locker room, it’s important and good for the whole team. But the most important thing for us now is tomorrow’s match against Freiburg.
The press conference of Carlos Corberán in detail:
Is there an update on In-beom Hwang and have you also decided on the starting line-up?
In-beom is still recovering in order to get back on the team, and as it turns out, he won’t be with us tomorrow, that’s all I can tell you. Regarding the line-up, yes, I have decided on the starting eleven.
Freiburg has exhibited good elements in the championship. Which element is it that worries you?
What I’m examining is how we’ll get the best chance to face Freiburg and get the best result. Tomorrow’s game is so demanding that I demand the highest level of performance from every player and the entire team, in order to be as competitive as our opponent will be. This is the motivation that any footballer has, the fact that they know that they will always have to deal with challenging games and have to present the best version of themselves.
In the last series of games, the team has not been entering the first half powerfully. How do you explain this and how do you intend to fix the issue?
We have had a good start in some games, such as the one with Apollo Limassol. But although in some matches we started out well during the first minutes, we then somehow “lost our spark”. There’s a coach who says that the first 90’ minutes of the game are very important, and I absolutely agree with that. So that’s my goal. Clearly, in soccer you have to play well, if you start off poorly you then have to find ways to make up for it in order to play well; this is our goal, to correct our mistakes and succeed.
Is Valbuena available? Apart from your own tenure, Olympiacos has experienced a lot of muscle injuries, how do you explain that?
He will not be available because he has a muscle injury, which is not serious, but does not allow him to compete. It is true that when I joined the team there were several muscle injury problems and we are trying to reduce them because this is important to manage. It is clear that the training period is important and has a considerable impact during the matches. Thus, I can only deal with things that I can control, so we’re trying to reduce muscle injuries and we’ve achieved that. It makes sense when a player changes coaches to change the way they perform. But it’s entirely different when you have one game per week than two games per week. The approach changes completely and everything is done differently. However, the most beautiful but demanding thing is to take part in two competitions; this is what we want – we are participating in two competitions and we are working on it in order to be competitive.
El-Arabi is a soccer player who comes from a goal match, although he appeared as a substitute. He always scores against the German teams, so will he be in the starting line-up? Are you taking into account a player’s fitness and tradition?
I’ll get back to you tomorrow on that when you see the starting eleven. If El-Arabi has this tradition, it’s good for us, because whether he gets in as a first or a substitute and he gets to score, it’s good. What we want is to maintain positive traditions and correct the negative ones.
In relation to the match against Nantes, are we going to see a different formation?
It’s clear that whether we play with three or four defenders, the players have adapted to these systems and know them well. Therefore, the criterion for deciding on the system that we are going to use is the state of our players and the second criterion is who the opponent is in order to decide which system we are going to use to deal with the team we are facing.
