Di Francesco: ‘Lecce need to concentrate positive energy’ for final 5 games

Eusebio Di Francesco admits Lecce failing to take their scoring opportunities is ‘the crux of our season,’ but hopes they can ‘concentrate positive energy’ after the 1-1 draw with Fiorentina.

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This was a must-win fixture for the Salentini, who saw Cremonese pick up a point in yesterday’s 0-0 draw at Torino, leaving them in the bottom three.

Di Francesco surprisingly left his top scorers on the bench to begin with, but he was perhaps trying to take advantage of Fiorentina’s Conference League efforts against Crystal Palace on Thursday, unleashing his best strikers for the last 35 minutes.

Jack Harrison’s curling finish had put the Viola in front before half-time, but Tiago Gabriel nodded in a corner to equalise, the first goal scored by Lecce after three and a half Serie A games.

Di Francesco saw a strong Lecce

“We were coming off a run of consecutive defeats, where individual errors had compromised our results,” Di Francesco told DAZN Italia.

“I think we had been doing very well even before their goal, then managed to react and in the second half pinned Fiorentina back for over 30 minutes. I saw a lot of chances, with Pierotti, Coulibaly, Stulic, but we were unable to convert the chances.

“That is the basic crux of our season. However, I will take the good performance, I told the lads with this mentality and hunger, we can achieve our aim.”

This 1-1 result means Lecce and Cremonese remain locked together on 28 points, with Cagliari next ahead on 33, then Fiorentina with 36.

It is no secret where their problems lie, scoring only 22 goals in 33 Serie A games, and wasting several more big opportunities this evening.

“We can certainly improve, but I liked the number of crosses into the box and pull backs. With Gandelman, he is sort of an extra striker, giving the team balance. This side is working to achieve safety with a certain organisation, but we put so many balls into the penalty area today,” confessed Di Francesco.

“There is a technical skill in attacking certain spaces, we’ve been working on it all season and I’ll continue to focus on it this week in training, because that is how we can score more goals.”

It had already been confirmed that Lecce would go into a two-week training retreat to prepare for the decisive upcoming games, away to Verona on Saturday, then at Pisa on May 1.

At the final whistle, the fans called the players over to their Curva and sang encouragement, demanding ’11 Lions’ in those matches.

“We analysed the statistics and almost always conceded goals around the 30^th minute, so we have to work on that. I don’t want it to become a mental issue, otherwise we’ll get stuck in a doom loop of worrying around that time,” added Di Francesco.

“It’s important to finish off these opportunities that we create, especially when getting down the wide areas. We’re concentrating all our positive energy with this training retreat, ensuring we have full control of everything from rest hours to nutrition, so we can be at our best in these crucial weeks.”