"Playing good football, winning and being united"

PREVIEW

Benfica play their first official match at the Cathedral in the 2024/25 season this Saturday, August 17, at 8:30 pm, against Casa Pia, on matchday 2 of the Liga Betclic. It's an opportunity, according to coach Roger Schmidt, for the Eagles to “play good football and win”, thus taking the “first step” towards winning the competition. 

A few days ago, Roger Schmidt said that the team had to give another response in the game against Casa Pia. Is it important just to win, or to play a quality game as well?

Both things are always our objectives. We want to win games and do it with good football. As a coach, I'm convinced that if you play good football, you're more likely to win. That's always what we're looking for, and that's what we did during pre-season. At Benfica, if you lose a game, especially if you lose points, it's always a difficult situation, because we all know what our goals are in the league. We know that we have to win a lot of points during the season, and we've already dropped three points. We're under pressure, that's completely clear. We have to be calm in this situation, especially me, we have to believe in ourselves, we have to believe in the players and in the footballing approach. We've used this week to analyze the game, to prepare ourselves in the best way possible so that we can play a good game and win tomorrow [Saturday, August 17], because that's the only answer that counts. We're looking forward to playing at our stadium, we want to show our fans a good game and get a win.

Last season didn't go the way Benfica wanted, and this year hasn't got off to the best start either. If you were in the Benfica fans' shoes, what would you change? Will you change anything for the game against Casa Pia?

I'm also a Benfica fan. I'm a coach, but also a fan. Of course, as I said before, we want to be champions every year, but in Portugal the competition is tough. Last season, we fought almost to the end to become champions, but in the end we had to accept that Sporting had a better season and deserved to be champions. However, I think that, looking back at the last two seasons, we can see that several good things have happened. The titles we won, only two, but still more than before, and the development of the players. Our mission also involves replacing very important players, and in two years several have left, and we've tried to have a team ready to fight for Benfica's goals. In difficult times, it's very important to be patient and believe in the team, the players and everyone who does everything on a daily basis to make the fans happy. That's my belief. We lost the game on Sunday [August 11], and it wasn't what we expected. Playing your first league match on a Sunday afternoon in Famalicão isn't easy. It's not that we can't win the game, but it's not easy. And then, with the story of the game, especially the early goal, they [Famalicão] were good, defended well and we weren't as creative in attack. In the end, we had to accept it, but there are still 33 more matches this season and that's what we have to focus on.

Are there any developments regarding Neres and other players wanted by other clubs, such as Kökcü and Morato? How difficult is it for you as a coach to deal with the situation so that the players can get away from the market?

It's not easy, of course, but it's normal in football. Whenever the transfer window is open, we have this kind of situation where we can lose players, and when we do, we have to be prepared to sign other players to maintain a good quality in the team. I try to be as honest as I can with you [journalists] at the press conference, but I don't think it always makes sense to give you the situation and the moment of each player. Do we have a transfer or not? That's what I can announce. I can't talk about certain players' negotiations all the time. As long as the players are here, they are my players and Benfica players. If they leave, they leave. So far, nothing concrete has happened. There are negotiations, especially around David [Neres], as I said last week. We have a clear situation: the player wants to leave, but I have to say that he is very professional and behaves very well in training. But there are very concrete negotiations and, of course, I always have to take that into account when preparing for matches. That's the situation, and it's the same with the other players. We'll see what happens until the last day of the transfer window, but, of course, in my decisions, I also have to look at the current commitment of each player and decide whether they can be a player for the team. 

You've said that you're a Benfica coach, but that you're also a Benfica fan. Putting yourself in the shoes of the Benfica fans, do you understand this protest that has been going on since the end of last season (2023/24) and has now moved on to the start of this 2024/25 season?

Of course I understand. If we lose games and don't succeed, I understand the fans' dissatisfaction. Because what they expect and what they want is to celebrate titles and victories in matches with us, they also want to win trophies and competitions. I understand that perfectly. That's what we work for every day, to achieve that. Of course our hope is to win every title, but we also have to be realistic, and in football we have a difficult competition. It's not easy to win titles in Portugal, not even for Benfica. But in my opinion, our situation isn't a disaster. We lost the first game away from home, that's not good, it makes everything more difficult, but I see my players working in training, I've seen them throughout pre-season, how well they can play, the way they fit into the footballing approach, and at the moment we're working to make the fans happy again. We want to start tomorrow [Saturday, August 17], play very good football from the start, with intensity, with everything we're used to showing at our stadium too, and then we can take the first step and then many more steps to follow.

After a season that didn't go well, the manager spoke about the whistles that were blown at the team and that this could even harm their performance. After the defeat [in Famalicão], are you afraid that this will happen again and could harm the team against Casa Pia?

I've talked about it a lot, and I'm not going to talk about it anymore. The best thing we can do is play good football tomorrow [Saturday, August 17], win the match and all be united.