Neither the poster of favorites against Real Sociedad, nor the proximity of the Champions League final against Lyon in a week’s time. Jonatan Giráldez is not worried that his team is not focused on tomorrow’s Cup final against Real. “I don’t see relaxation. On the contrary, there is a lot of hunger, a lot of desire to win titles. I see a lot of concentration, desire and ambition in this team,” Giráldez said in the preview.
The Blaugrana coach is confident in his team: “We have the habit of buying what is most important, but a title is a title and we have to give 100% if we want to win it. I don’t notice at all that the players are not thinking about tomorrow’s game. Nobody is thinking about next week’s game.”
Giráldez announced that Sandra Paños will start tomorrow. The Alicante goalkeeper will play her last final before leaving the club this summer, after a year in which she handed over the main role to Cata Coll: “It has not been an easy year for me, with a different role than the one I was used to, “But I am enjoying the last few minutes I have left at the club and focused on leaving with the maximum number of titles.”
He acknowledges that Real “is not having as regular a league season as the previous ones,” but believes that “that will not affect it because it is a final.” Furthermore, he trusts that Barça has the resources to respond to any approach with which Natalia Arroyo wants to surprise him: “One of the things in which we have improved is the team’s ability to adapt according to what the rival proposes to us, we will know how to find solutions.”
“It is always the same torture when you consider how to play against Barça. We have tried different things, but this Barça has resolved all approaches with victories. We will try to replicate the things that have worked for us,” Arroyo confessed. The Real Sociedad coach expects a “vibrant final” and she wants it to be “long” to put Barça on the ropes. It will be the Catalan coach’s second final as head of Real Sociedad. The first was last year’s Super Cup in which they also faced Barça. The Txuri-Urdin team lost 0-3 in Mérida in a final that is remembered for the controversy over the awarding of medals, which the players had to collect themselves from a folding table.
