Valverde credits Olimpico crowd for ‘extraordinary’ atmosphere | OneFootball

Athletic Bilbao boss Ernesto Valverde credited the Stadio Olimpico crowd in tonight’s display in the first leg of the Europa League Round of 16.

After the 2-1 defeat to Roma, Valverde spoke to reporters.

“I don’t want to talk about the referee. We started getting yellows too early. I don’t have much to add.”

“There was a great atmosphere and Roma is a great team, but the referee was very careless about giving out cards.”

“The return leg? We are strong at home and we hope that there is half the atmosphere that we found here. Extraordinary atmosphere, very exciting. We hope we can come back from this loss.”

“Roma have Dovbyk, Dybala, Soulè, players who can resolve the match, but we play the return leg at home and we hope to win there.”

“When we scored they pushed continuously. We had a fair amount of control of the game, except when we went down to one man and they managed to find the decisive play. When the game is balanced there is never a good time to concede a goal.”