The defender of the Italian “Roma” Gianluca Mancini shared his thoughts on the Ukrainian forward of his team, Artem Dovbik.
“Artem is a golden boy, exceptional. We know that, unfortunately, his family is going through a tough time right now, and I think that affects him. But on the football field, for 90 minutes of the game, you need to be able to forget everything.
I sometimes joke with him because he is just a four-door wardrobe; I’m almost afraid of him in training: sometimes, after a challenge with him, you fly four meters away!
In the first half of the match against “Lecce” (Serie A, “Lecce” — “Roma“ — 0:1, the author of the only goal was Dovbik, — ed.) I told him: “Either you score a goal or you get a yellow card. I want to see you shoulder the defender into the air!” And then it happened that Dovbik’s winning goal came after his shoulder push on Baschirotto. They are both big, but Artem went at him with the necessary sporting rage and ended up scoring. And I told him then, “You’re strong, you should scatter everyone.” But, of course, in a football context,” Mancini’s words are cited by europacalcio.it.