José-Luis Medicimapr emphasized that there is a sense of impatience at Olympiacos and that he is still trying to adjust to his fourth year in Greece; He highlighted the difficulty of changing a player’s and the team’s style of play, considers it understandable that players get frustrated when they can’t score easily even when they have the upper hand, he praised the fans for their support of him personally, asked them to put the previous match behind them and focus on the next one, and highlighted the many changes that have occurred in the roster.

In detail:

On the difficult days following the elimination from the Champions League: “Olympiacos is a demanding club; there’s a sense of impatience, and a bad result can lead to many things, but that’s just how we are. This is my fourth season at Olympiacos, and I’m still trying to adjust to the reality of life in Greece. I’m the foreigner; I’m the one who has to adapt.”

On Olympiacos’ style of play: “It’s not easy to change a player’s style of play overnight. I don’t believe there are 40 different ways for a team to play, nor can you change a team’s style of play overnight. Coaches usually have to adapt to the players they have, based on what each one can offer. Sometimes the opposite should happen, too. Unfortunately, that rarely happens for coaches.”

As for whether he noticed the same phenomenon against Atromitos as last year—namely, Olympiacos getting nervous when they can’t score a quick goal: “When nerves and anxiety get the better of you, you usually stop trying. Today, in the second half, we created more chances. We didn’t show that we were affected by the fact that we weren’t scoring, even though we had 4–5 chances. Even if we’d won in the last minute, we weren’t playing with anxiety or nerves; we stayed calm, made clear moves, and, even though the opposing goalkeeper was very good, we kept pushing.”

On the fans’ support: “I don’t know how to put it into words; I’m happy and grateful for the support. Support that might influence decisions that may have already been made. Thank you very much for the fans’ support.”.

On how he envisions Olympiacos moving forward: “The good things you achieve in soccer are forgotten very quickly. So we can’t dwell on the past. Coaches know we have to live with that. When something goes wrong, we forget the past, and that’s normal because the team has to keep winning.”

On the many changes to the roster: “On June 29, when we started preseason training, we had 22 players, seven of whom are no longer on the team. A lot of faces have changed; and we’re now set to start the league on August 22 with a completely different lineup. And given the way soccer is today—with transfers allowed until September 10 or 11— summer training serves no purpose at all. We know that more new players will be coming, so we have to wait for the roster to be finalized and then start thinking about what will happen with our team.”

*photo source: KYPE