At the final whistle, Claudio Ranieri's tears are the tears of joy of all the Cagliari fans, for a feat that many times seemed impossible. Five and a half months after the great return, the Roman coach has accomplished yet another feat of his career, he who made Leicester City win the Premier League.
And, mission accomplished, he explains why it took him a while before accepting: «The question of returning was precisely this: not succeeding in the enterprise. Cagliari was the place that made me explode and going around Europe, coming back here and not being able to bring them back to Serie A would have been a huge defeat for me. My fear was to dirty this image, then I told myself that Cagliari was in trouble and wanted me: I couldn't be selfish, tonight they repaid me for everything».
The praise. Ranieri congratulates the team, who put all their energies up to the last second of the last match: «There are some guys with big hearts, I said there would be sixty thousand people but that we had a people behind us. We had to get them out in silence: we succeeded, then congratulations to Bari. I told our fans to celebrate and not blame the opponent». And he too meets the fans at the airport «I experienced it when we went from C to B, from B to A and when we saved ourselves, the Cagliari crowd is always ready».