14.06.2007 15:04
Thuram: “There’s one match left and everything is possible”
David Puig
Barça’s French international defender told a Camp Nou press conference on Thursday that the title race will go down to the final whistle of the final match: “Football is incredible and you can’t say that winning is impossible”.
Everything’s possible in football and this wouldn’t be the first time that a league
title has been won by a team going into the final match trailing in second or third place. Lilian
Thuram told reporters today: “The league isn’t over yet. There’s one match left
and football is incredible. There’s nothing decided and we can’t say that winning the
league is impossible”. Thuram won the Italian league in the last match of the season while
playing for Juventus: “Inter were the leaders and we were second. In the last match, Inter
only had to win their match to be champions but they slipped up and we got the three points and
were proclaimed league champions”.
Respect for Mallorca and Gimnàstic
Thuram also emphasised that it would be dangerous to underestimate
Mallorca (who play Real Madrid in the Bernabeu) and Gimnàstic, Barça’s opponent in
Tarragona’s Nou Estadi: “If I were playing for Mallorca I would do everything possible
to get a good result”. He also said that he understood perfectly that Gimnàstic manager Paco
Flores is especially keen to beat Barça: “It’s perfectly normal that the manager of any
team should want to beat one of the big clubs like Barça. These victories give you prestige and
nobody should be offended by that”.
An evaluation of the season
Whatever happens on Sunday, Thuram believes the season cannot be classed as a failure:
“After winning two league titles and the Champions League, it’s very difficult to
repeat those successes for a third season. So I don’t think that not winning this league
would be a failure. A team can’t always be perfect and win all the matches or win league
titles by an eight-point margin. The more titles you win, the more difficult it becomes to repeat
the success”.
On a personal level, Thuram is happy with his first season with Barça: “I started off
playing very little and that was normal. I had arrived at a championship-winning team and it was
difficult for the manager to make changes. Then, little by little, I started getting into the team
and playing more until now I’m playing more regularly. I’m doing very well and I intend
to see out my contract and continue next season”.