Source: Telegraph
Put out your best team in FA Cup
I remember every emotion, I remember every step of the Wembley stairs until we reached the top and received the cup and the medals. Sure, the Premiership is the Premiership, but the FA Cup, well, that is an incredible trophy to win. [LNB]So that's why you have to respect your Cup, take it seriously. [LNB]The way most English clubs approached the FA Cup when I was at Chelsea was inspiring. It is a feeling that I have tried to transmit to the Italian Cup and I think I have had a little success. [LNB]For the first time we have all the best clubs playing with their strongest teams in this competition, with a vision to win. Last week we had Inter, Roma, Sampdoria, Udinese, everybody with their best teams, bringing more people to the games, bringing more responsibility to the game. [LNB]The way the English would approach the Cup I thought was really top and I inherited that emotion from the English game. I do not want to lose that and that is why I take these games so seriously with Inter. I hope this English passion for this traditional trophy does not change. [LNB]I am preparing my team for our game with Sampdoria at the San Siro tonight so I will not be able to watch the Liverpool-Everton game but I am sure such a great derby game will be played with emotion. [LNB]It has been interesting watching Liverpool this season: I think they have everything they need to win the title. I still can't understand why they didn't do it in the last four years. Why wouldn't they be able to do it this season? Of course they can. But the point is to see how they react when the Champions League starts. [LNB]Usually it is when the Champions League starts that they y lose their focus on the Premiership. It was like this in previous years when they did very well in the Champions League but they lost too many points in the championship. [LNB]They have already lost 10 points at home by drawing the kind of matches they used to win. Against Stoke, Fulham, West Ham, Hull and Everton it has been two points lost. So if you can imagine that they had those 10 points now, they would be top of the league. The manager is good, the players are good, the crowd is unique, the tradition of the club is big, so why can't they do it? I think they can. [LNB]As for these stories I read about Rafael Benitez and Alex Ferguson exchanging words, this is all part of the game. This is the sort of thing that always happens when you fight for a championship. I had it in Portugal and in England. I'm sure it will happen in Italy, too. It is part of the fight you have to make to win a title, part of the pressure that managers try and put on other managers, clubs and structures to try to get an advantage. [LNB]Of course, when I was at Chelsea we had these things. I think a rivalry is more active when you play in the same league, when you compete every week in the same country. In England you have Manchester United, Chelsea and Liverpool fighting for the Premiership. These words in the press are part of the game. I think Benitez and Ferguson respect each other and both know they are contenders for the title. I don't think it is personal. [LNB]And now there could be a new name in the title race in the future: Manchester City. I think it is very good for the Premiership that this new financial power has arrived. If the title race changes from a race of four to a race of five, I think it is better. Competitiveness brings more intense emotion, and more intense emotion gets everybody watching. I'm not in the English league anymore but if I was I would be happy about the arrival of Manchester City in the picture. [LNB]But I am happy that Kaka didn't go there. I want the best players to be in my league. I want my league to be as strong as possible and of course Kaka is absolutely top. It would have been very, very bad for Italian football if Kaka had left Serie A. But at the same time I can understand that Manchester City, with such financial power, wants first of all to win credibility, to win the respect of football people. [LNB]The first step for them is not for football people to just look at them as a financial power, but as financial power linked to a future project, with something really big to chase. And if a club like Manchester City can bring in a player like Kaka, they win that credibility in two seconds. When a player like him decides to join City it will be because they have proved there is a big project; because I don't think a player like Kaka is going to leave a club like Milan because of one euro more or one euro less. [LNB]Ultimately football is about winning the emotion of winning trophies, not money; whether it is the Champions League, the Premiership, Serie A or the FA Cup. And it doesn't get much more emotional than winning the FA Cup.[LNB]
