Brighton manager Roberto De Zerbi has backed on-loan Barcelona youngster Ansu Fati to improve and strengthen as he looks to make the most of his Premier League debut.
Brighton manager Roberto De Zerbi has praised’special player’ Ansu Fati and believes the Barcelona loanee can only improve.
Fati has two goals in two games for Brighton, including a 2-0 win over Ajax in the Europa League at the Amex Stadium on Thursday night. The 20-year-old came off the bench to score in last weekend’s loss to Manchester City and could make his Premier League debut against Fulham on Sunday.
De Zerbi believes Fati has great potential, telling reporters, “He played very well (against Ajax), but he can improve and get better.” Ansu‘s focus should be on enjoying football and rediscovering the enthusiasm he had in the early stages of his career. I believe he can improve physically as well.”
“He is a special player, as is Joao Pedro,” he added. They are only performing at 60% of their potential. I believe they can push again, and we are assisting them because if they perform well, we will win more games.”
Because of the addition of Europa League football to Brighton‘s schedule this season, De Zerbi will be forced to rotate his players more frequently, but he revealed: “This season, with playing so many games per week, we have to change, but Joao Pedro and Ansu Fati are within our ideal first XI.”
“They can become stronger when they have (the chance) to score in the final third, but working with young players, you have to work harder to improve them because after their improvement, then the team will improve also.”
De Zerbi will be hoping for no European hangover when Fulham comes to town on Sunday. The Cottagers were defeated by league leaders Tottenham on Monday night, and their poor form has dropped them to the bottom half of the table.
Despite some key personnel departures, De Zerbi believes Brighton’s opponents should not be underestimated. “Fulham lost (Aleksandar) Mitrovic and also (Manor) Solomon, but they are still a good team,” De Zerbi said in a statement.
“Raul Jimenez is a great player, as is (Andreas) Pereira, Willian, (Antonee) Robinson, and (Timothy) Castagne, so they are a very good team with a very good coach who I greatly respect.” But we’re focused on ourselves and what we need to do to win the game and demonstrate the caliber of our players.”
To do so, De Zerbi understands that Brighton cannot afford any more sloppy defending like they did when they were thrashed 6-1 at Aston Villa last month. “Our focus is to score a lot of goals, but another target is to make clean sheets and not concede so many goals like in the past,” he added.
“We despise conceding goals, especially when they are bad goals.” We have conceded far too many goals in this part of the season.”
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