'We can be trashed, but we will always bounce back'

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De Zerbi expects his team to show their fighting spirit in Rome on Thursday night.

Charlie Hanson

2024-03-07T06:00:00Z

Roberto De Zerbi's team face Roma on Thursday night at the Stadio Olimpico.

Roberto De Zerbi wants his team to write history on Thursday when they take on Roma in the first leg of their Europa League last 16 match at the Stadio Olimpico.

It would require a big response from Albion following their defeat at Fulham on Saturday, but our Italian head coach knows his team can respond to difficult results.

“I am very proud to be be back in this country with my team,” Roberto said. “I usually fall in love with my teams and my players, like in Foggia, Benevento, Sassuolo, even Shakhtar where I only spent six months.

Roberto De Zebri's team were beaten by Fulham in their last outing.

“I always feel very attached to the team and the environment, but this is a team that I really love. This is a team that can lose 3-0, that can be trashed, it can be overwhelmed, but you look at the level of this team and it always bounces back. They always react after a heavy defeat.

“We pick ourselves up and we do it by playing with pride, with hunger."

The Italian also expects his team to take the ‘hot’ atmosphere at the Stadio Olimpico in their stride.

“We have already played at Old Trafford and won, we played away at Marseille and we drew 2-2, we won at AEK Athens in a very hot stadium.

“I know how hard Roma will push and it’s going to be a test for sure, but in my opinion this should motivate us, this should give us an extra boost.

“I have been coaching for ten years now and I have had five or six teams and this is the team where the players are most similar to me in terms of pride, hunger, dignity, motivation, values. Both the young and senior players in how they live football, they are very similar to me.

The Albion team trained on the Stadio Olimpico pitch on Wednesday night.

“With the injuries, we have two ways to approach it. We can either complain and cry about it, or we take it as a chance to compete without these missing players.

“Plus, there are no guarantees [that even] with the injured players like Joao Pedro, Kaoru Mitoma and James Milner we would go through. I don’t want to listen to any complaints because we have enough to be competitive.”