Roberto De Zerbi light-heartedly confronted a “negative” journalist after Tottenham secured Premier League survival on the season’s final day.
Spurs beat Everton 1-0 thanks to Joao Palhinha’s first-half goal, to stay up and condemn West Ham to the Championship with Burnley and Wolves.
Fans, players and staff celebrated passionately inside the Tottenham Hotspur Stadium after the final whistle.
But before De Zerbi conducted his post-match media duties, he stopped the press conference to ask for a particular journalist.
“Where is he?” De Zerbi said. “The one who is always there at the Tottenham training ground. He was negative and I’m positive. But I want to hug him, not to fight. I have no energy to fight anymore.”
When the reporter arrived, the pair shook hands. De Zerbi smiled and said: “Are you happy?” The reporter offered his congratulations.
After the press conference, De Zerbi again spoke to the journalist and suggested they had been negative about Tottenham’s survival chances. The reporter responded: “It’s my job to ask questions, it’s not my job to be positive.”
After the survival mission was completed with a glass of red wine, the Italian spoke of his pride at how his injury-hit squad had responded to the crisis.
However, he stressed there was no time to waste to ensure that Spurs never find themselves in a position defender Micky van de Ven described as “embarrassing” again.
“I think we deserve to stay up, because we made 11 points in seven games and we deserved more,” said De Zerbi. “From tonight, we have to start to organise and to build the new team. I don't think we have to change too many players. We have 10, 11, 12 players good enough to stay. But first we must complete the squad with first-level players.
“We suffered too much. I suffered a lot, the players suffered a lot and the fans. We can't suffer like this until the last second of the last game to stay up. The target to stay up is finished. My target now is to start the pre-season with the team I have in my dream.”
De Zerbi praised the long-suffering Tottenham fans who stood in massed ranks to greet the team bus on Sunday before a game that could have had calamitous consequences had it gone wrong.
“Next season the target is to make them happier than this season for sure,” he said. “I would like to compete, I don’t know for what, but stop suffering like this.”
additional reporting by Reuters