Ancelotti Full Of Praise For Srnicek
Sunday 19th November 2000
Juventus manager Carlo Ancelotti made light of the goal-drought afflicting
his side after the goalless draw against Brescia. Only a sensational
performance by goalkeeper Pavel Srnicek denied the Turin giants, he said.
"The problems arise when you don't create chances," he said. "But today we
created many and unfortunately we failed to exploit them because their
keeper had a great game.
"I was very happy with the way the defence played and Van der Saar was
rarely tested. This is not a good moment for us in terms of results but we
played well today and against Lazio last week.
"Roma are the team of the moment and theirs is a serious challenge (for the
Scudetto)," he added. "They showed it again today beating Verona at the
Bentegodi stadium, which is always a difficult result to achieve."
Former Newcastle goalkeeper Srnicek was awarded man of the match by
journalists at the Rigamonti stadium and the Czech international, who has
yet to learn Italian, spoke of the topsy-turvy world of goalkeeping.
"Last week I was one of those blamed by the fans for the defeat against
Atalanta," he said. "Today things went well. That's a goalkeeper's destiny.
When things go well you're a hero, when you make mistakes - which almost
always result in goals being conceded - then you're the villain."
Brescia manager Carlo Mazzone was in typically ironic form after the game. A
Roma fan, Mazzone was asked if he was something of a soothsayer as he picked
Roma to win the League at the start of the season.
"Since my prophecies always come true, I'd just like to make another today.
And that's that Brescia will avoid the drop at the end of the season," he
said.
"We earned a draw against a crisis-ridden Juventus today. Well, thank
goodness Juventus are in crisis. Can you imagine how well they'll play when
they hit form.
"Maybe it's better that the penalty wasn't given. Otherwise we would have
scored, but Juve would have ended up winning the game 2-1.
"Jokes aside, we played well, even if some technical players like Baggio
were penalised by the conditions of this muddy, heavy pitch."
