Roberto Mosquera after Sporting Cristal's defeat to Flamengo: “We competed at a good level. We deserved more”

Sporting Cristal was unable to make a good home debut in the Copa Libertadores and lost to Flamengo of Brazil in what was the first date of group H. The cast 'cervecero' showed the game proposal that characterizes them, but it was not enough to get a victory. In that regard, the coach, Roberto Mosquera, spoke about this meeting and left several points about his analysis.

The first is the disgust for having done things well on the field, but not being able to transfer it to the scoreboard. Added to this is the economic power of Brazilian clubs in general, whose budget is the highest in South America. “Every result always tastes bitter, but it's less bitter when they arrive 3 times and you don't score the goals; the opponent arrives 3 times and scores 2 goals. What sets the mood of a team when it loses, is the way it does it. I think we played a pretty decent game. We are talking about a team that has 175 million a year, that has 5 equal teams,” the coach confessed at a press conference for Cristal TV.

However, that was not all, as he added that superiority in ball holding is one of the factors that must be rescued. In addition, the fact that the 'Mengao' committed almost twice as many fouls as the 'rimenses'. “We competed at a good level, which means we had 52% possession. The critics will say what you have the ball for if you didn't score, but this is not seen in every match, subdue as we did Flamengo. Everyone can tell that they had 48% and we had 52%. In the end, what matters is the result. Flamengo made 19 fouls and 9 of us. With 12 fouls there must have been one expelled. If there was one way to lose, it was this. It hurts emotionally, but it is more bearable when we did what we had to do with what we had to do with what we had to do,” he said.

The 65-year-old DT also made a self-criticism. The 'bajopontino' footballers were not fine on the few scoring occasions they had, so against a team of that size, they pay very dearly and with goals against. “The game leads you to be forceful or not. The chance of a goal we had was because we beat Flamengo in the collective game. Forcefulness appears when you have the opportunities and of course, we waste. The opponent is an elite team, he arrives twice and scores the goals for you. What I didn't notice is a distance between them and us, and Argentine journalists commented on it. There is a feeling that we deserved more and we feel it too. Having our feet on the ground, it was too much punishment,” he said.

And it is that the 'celeste' squad suffered the 'cariocas' attacks in the first minutes, but this was matched and the locals tried to play as equals, generating some chances of danger without the effectiveness to transform them into a goal. The first score of the visit came after a bad pass on the way out of Omar Merlo, who left it very fair to Leandro Sosa and there was an attack from the band that ended up culminating Bruno Henrique . Even at that time, the Peruvian team did not lower its arms and looked for spaces by rotating the ball.

Irven Ávila was one of Cristal's most outstanding players, who constantly moved around the offensive zone, trying to move behind the rival. For moments he succeeded, although returning to the same thing Mosquera mentioned, they did not know how to convert. Of course, in front of them they had a team that is the recent runner-up of the Copa Libertadores, whose second score was made through Matheuzinho at the top of the 'celestes'.

NEXT MATCH

Sporting Cristal turned the page on this commitment and will now focus on Liga 1 and the next match they will have in the international competition against Universidad Católica as a visitor. The match will be played on Tuesday, April 12 at the San Carlos de Apoquindo Stadium in Chile.

KEEP READING