Ranieri: “We’ve won two important battles, but we still have to win the war”

Claudio Ranieri called on his Sampdoria side to finish the job and secure their Serie A status after the 3-0 win over SPAL on Sunday night.

“We’ve won two important – crucial – battles, but we still have to win the war,” said the Doria boss after the game at Marassi. “We were practical and determined and it was a good performance. We eased off a bit after our first goal, but then we did well to score twice more. We used our quality players to slow the game down in the second half. Credit to them all.”

Ranieri was keen to ensure his players stay focused on their goal of avoiding relegation, despite two big wins in a few days handing Doria a much-needed boost.

“We’re not nearly there – we can’t make that mistake,” said Ranieri. “We have two away games coming up and we need to do our best. We were right in the midst of it earlier in the season – we got ourselves out but then we got dragged back in, so we need to be wary. I’m pleased that the team made a fast start today – that’s what I’d asked for. I told them to think how it would feel to be in Serie B and that resulted in the performance we saw tonight.”