10 March 2010

Hodgson: «It is of great satisfaction to play against Juve»

A known face and a team never seen before. Roy Hodgson’s Fulham landed in Turin. In Italy, the coach worked with Inter and Udinese. It was an arrival marked by the snow, which fell all day, obliging the English team to change their plans. Instead of the traditional training session at the Olimpico, they trained at the Juventus Center in Vinovo: «We could have asked for the cover to be removed – declared Hodgson during the press conference – but we did not want to ruin the field, and so we accepted the invitation from Juventus to use their sports center. Today the real winner was the bad weather».

In order to understand who will win the first leg of the final 16 of the Europa League we will have to wait until tomorrow. Being able to play against Juventus is already a victory for Fulham but the Londoners are far from considering themselves beaten. Hodgson confirmed: «For us it is of great satisfaction having made it to this point and being able to play against a great team like Juventus. It is the crowning of all we have done in recent years, but we do not want to stop here and want to keep improving, conscious of the fact that there is still much to be done to reach the level of clubs like Juventus, Inter, Milan, Chelsea or Liverpool ».

Finally two answers for the Italian journalists, on the duel with Zaccheroni and his previous Italian experience. «I don’t think that the fact that I am ahead of Zaccheroni counts. It depends on the teams we coached in the past. It will not be a duel between two coaches but between two teams. Here in Italy, I was happy and I like to return. Inter? Tomorrow’s match has nothing to do with my previous experience. I am only interested in Fulham now».

After having already played against Roma in the group stage, Fulham returns to Italy and does so without former giallorosso Okaka, who joined the Londoners in January but who cannot play due to regulations, and captain Murphy who is suspended. It will probably be Aaron Hughes to wear the captain’s band. The latter was also present at the Juventus Center press room: «Ever since we are children we hear people speaking of Juventus and everybody would like to play against them and this is why we are awaiting the match with great anxiousness and excitement. Juve is always Juve, even though it is not going through its best season. We know we will be playing against a European heavyweight but we will try to give our best to obtain a positive result».

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Atalanta	Palermo	1 - 2
Bari	Fiorentina	2 - 0
Cagliari	Bologna	1 - 1
Catania	Genoa	1 - 0
Chievo	Roma	0 - 2
Lazio	Udinese	3 - 1
Milan	Juventus	3 - 0
Parma	Livorno	4 - 1
Sampdoria	Napoli	1 - 0
Siena	Inter	0 - 1