On one of the bottoms of the Luigi Ferraris stadium in Genoa, a banner with a silhouette and a legend appeared in each game: "Gasperson". As in a Premier League stadium, there were no divisions when it came to paying homage to the technicians who make history. The tifosi of Genoa encumbran their particular Alex Ferguson, Gian Piero Gasperini (Grugliaso, 1958), the coach who, in two different stages, returned them to the Serie A and left them touching the Champions League. The passion he unleashed in the Grifone is now lived in Bergamo, where the nickname is kept alive in the stands of Atleti Azzurri .

In his hand, Atalanta has sneaked into the top 16 teams in Europe and will measure this Wednesday in the exile of San Siro the resistance of a Valencia with a defense to tatters, without Rodrigo and caught in the explosion of Ferran Torres . Gasperini knows the Milanese stadium well, because it was his home for a few months. A time when being the fashion technician in Italy earned him the call of Inter, who after the departure of José Mourinho chained the dismissals of Benitez and Leonardo .

In Moratti the praise that the Portuguese always dedicated to him weighed. «Gasperini has been the toughest coach I have ever faced. In an Inter-Genoa I changed the scheme five times to create difficulties and other times he countered me by changing his drawing a few minutes later. It was like a fight between dogs and cats . I had to win at all costs and he didn't want to lose under any circumstances. It was a spectacular 0-0 for those who love football ».

Speed

Little praise was given to this coach who escapes the iron Italian school with audacity and generates devotion among those at his command for his didactic ability to make them better. make them better. Thiago Motta, the Sevillist Suso or the Colombian Muriel , whose suggestion to seek the goal in diagonal enlarged him, although Ilicic and Zapata continue to complicate ownership.

The seal of the Italian technician fits perfectly with the spirit of the Goddess , who in Greek mythology fled from marriage by challenging her suitors to a career in which no one was able to defeat her. Speed ​​is one of Atalanta's weapons. Press the exit of the ball with coordinated movements, chasing rivals man to man and throwing the lanes in search of the complicity of the Argentine Papu Gómez , the creative brain, and the effectiveness of the two killers: Zapata and Ilicic.

That joy has led him to be the finest team in the European major leagues and the third that has scored the most goals behind PSG and Manchester City.

Especially worrisome is this statistic for Valencia in a tie where each goal can be an impulse or a stick of sand to the aspirations of reaching the quarterfinals: the team arrives broken by casualties in defense. To the sanction of Paulista, expelled before the Ajax, the rupture of ligaments of Garay was united with the window of market recently closed and the inopportune chickenpox of Florenzi. With Coquelin also out of the call for a muscle injury, Celades has no choice but to entrust himself to an inédica couple and, for the moment, unreliable: Diakhaby and Mangala .

Rodrigo's knees

The puzzle is complicated by the worrying loss of Rodrigo Moreno , called to be a catalyst for the game in the Catalan proposal. His knees, both of them, are playing tricks on him and yesterday instead of traveling to Bergamo, he passed medical examination in Vitoria trying to find a solution to what began as a sprain. Nor is Kangin Lee in Milan, but a Guedes in preseason who will have to accompany Maxi Gómez at the tip and the exalted Ferran Torres . If there is a player who can hit the Italians, he is the young extreme who surprises in Europe but still does not sign his renewal with Valencia.

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