Opening remarks
“I’d like to thank the players for their contribution to the club this season, as well as the technical staff and everyone involved at the club for their work this year. Thanks to the President, to Adam Braz, to Nick De Santis and to everyone who works so hard to help this team.”
On how the season progressed
“We started the season very well with four wins in six games. We saw some good things. We were very confident. We implemented certain things, built a base. This is a long season. We had ups and downs, which is normal. It’s a process. Every team in the league goes through tough moments. I’m pleased that we never fell below the red line, always stayed in the playoffs. That’s important. When tough moments occurred, we were able to come back even stronger. This is another sign that this is a strong group, mentally and on the field. In the end, in the playoffs, we were on a good run. Not a lot of people believe in us. In the game in D.C., we showed some good things, including the character that the team displayed to go there and win.”
On the lessons learned from this season
“You always learn something in this job. I grow from that and learn from all those experiences. It’s part of the job. This team losing in extra time in the playoffs after winning four straight, including two road games against good teams, makes us happy as a club – but we have to learn to go all the way. We went further this season again, but we want even more. This is an ambitious club. We want to win, it’s our philosophy. And it’s my job to keep passing this on to our players.”
On how the team’s play evolved
“At the beginning of the season, we wanted to implement an offensive organization where we would be a team that kept the ball. We started well; there were some good things in those first games. I remember the game against the Red Bulls, where we showed some good abilities to keep the ball. We fell into some injury trouble, mid-April into the month of May, partly due to switching from artificial to grass. It’s something we want to look into more closely going into next year, because those are the months when we pick up some more injuries. The overall health of the squad was very good this year, due in part to the work of my technical staff and to the way we managed the load of work. We went through a period when we lost some cohesion and rhythm. We made some changes midseason to have more bite in midfield and be able to recover balls and win duels. Hernán Bernardello coming back helped us. Toward the middle of the season, we also lost cohesion with some important players, like Ciman and Oyongo, leaving for international duty for long periods, and suspensions that forced us to make some changes. When things got settled in the middle, I saw some things in the 1-0 loss at New York that guided me in that direction, toward the formation I had late on in the season. The responsibilities of every player were settled. Results followed, and responsibilities became even clearer. Our confidence started to improve, and it contributed to our playoff run.”
