Garcia: Superstar skipper Totti is a genius

The Roma coach revealed that the veteran forward predicted before the game that he would steal the show and praised the way his side fought back from the brink against Lazio


Francesco Totti has been heralded as a genius after his goalscoring heroics saved Roma from derby day defeat to Lazio on Sunday.

The Giallorossi went 2-0 down in the opening half an hour through goals from Stefano Mauri and Felipe Anderson, but the veteran Italian forward turned the tie around with two strikes in the second half.

The striker even took a celebratory selfie after equalising for Roma with an acrobatic finish and his coach revealed that the 38-year-old had correctly predicted he would have a major impact on the derby match.

"Totti is a genius and he showed it," Garcia told reporters. "He said beforehand that this was his game and he was right."

Garcia, who guided Roma to second in Serie A last season, was pleased with the way his players fought back after a poor first-half performance and is keeping his fingers crossed that Napoli do his team a favour by beating Juventus later on Sunday.

"When you draw 2-2, it's better to be 2-0 down and fight back than the other way round. The lads played a great second half and reacted so well," he told Sky Sport.

"Lazio didn't have that many chances in the first half and mostly they were gifted to them by us. We need to improve on that, as we knew that with the pace of Antonio Candreva and Felipe Anderson we couldn't afford to lose the ball cheaply.

"Now we are top on level terms with Juventus, though our objective was to be top on our own. Tonight there is fourth against first and we obviously would prefer a Napoli victory."

Roma are on 40 points after 18 Serie A matches - level with Juventus ahead of Massimiliano Allegri's men clashing with Napoli, who are 10 points adrift of the table-topping pair.

Posted by Unknown on Sunday, January 11, 2015 - Rating: 4.5

Title : Garcia: Superstar skipper Totti is a genius
Description : The Roma coach revealed that the veteran forward predicted before the game that he would steal the show and praised the way his side fought ...

Tweet