“That's my prediction!” » Suffering from Sepsis, Dioszegi makes shocking revelations from the night of relegation and names the first team to drop from the Superliga: “The puzzle is different”

Laszlo Dioszegi barely got over the team's direct relegation last season. He is still involved in the team, working from the stadium and trying to find the best solutions for Sepsi to return to the Superliga this summer.

It's Thursday, 12:15 p.m., and the players are leaving the locker room one by one for training. Dioszegi takes the time to leave the office and spend a good few minutes watching Ovidiu Burcă's training session.

Half an hour before, he accepted an interview for Gazeta Sporturilor and says, with a smile on his face, that “I am very pleased to have disappeared from the landscape“. But he wants to specify from the very beginning that “not due to the fact that we were relegated to League 2, but I also had some free time to take care of the business.”

VIDEO. Laszlo Dioszegi: “The relegation was a big shock and we had no real leaders”

– Mr. Dioszegi, how are you? Sepsi is in 2nd place and soon the season will resume. Are you satisfied or could it be better?
– It would have been best if we were in 1st place, but if 2nd place stays until the end, then we will be satisfied.

– How is the atmosphere in the team?
– Now she is very good. The boys have already started preparations for seven days, they are preparing very seriously for what is to come until June. We are also going to Antalya, where we hope that we will have a training camp there too, with which we can attack the championship again.

– You started the season quite hard, was it a shock for the players, was it difficult to adjust to League 2?
– Yes, it was a big shock and unfortunately when we started League 2, there were some players, we have to admit, who did not perform as expected. We thought that if they come from the first league, then they will make a difference very quickly, but no. Due to the fact that it took almost two months for the team to slowly regain their confidence and physical strength.

– And you also brought Ovidiu Burcă, a specialist trainer for promotions.
– We hope the promotion comes with Sepsi!

– Important players remained at Sepsi, even though the team reached League 2, Matei, Aganovic, who returned home. How much does it matter that big names stayed with the team?
– It matters a lot! Matei and Aganovic are two big names, we can say, in Romanian football. At least in football in Sfântu Gheorghe… It's good to always have leaders. Maybe also due to the fact that last year we didn't have real leaders, the result was surprising.

“I don't think there is anyone from the club or from Sfântu Gheorghe who can explain to me why I was relegated”

– The biggest shock in football in recent years.
– It shocked the entire Romanian football world, including us, unfortunately. But sometimes, maybe in life you have to fall into the hole to know how to get out.

– Tell us…
– We have to take things in such a way that it is a lesson for the mind and, if we manage to promote this year back to the first league, after that let's not repeat the mistakes we made.

– After so many hard months for you, for the club, did you understand exactly what happened?
– I don't think there is anyone from the club or from Sfântu Gheorghe who can explain to me, personally, what happened. Maybe there were many things that we still don't realize. We still haven't been able to say that because of X or Y, we fell into League 2, but one thing is clear: the biggest fault was the footballers, because they are the ones who played on the pitch.

– Correct.
– We have to call things by name and that was the biggest problem. Plus, what can we say, we also changed three coaches in such a short time. I never did this thing, but then all the changes were justified. Now we can think what if…

– And did you think?
– What would have happened if we didn't change the coach or bring X, or bring Y, but it's in vain, we have to look ahead, not look at the past… The fact that we are in League 2 is worn out, but we have to stand up and move forward, raise our faces, our eyes and trust that things will return to what they were two, three, four years ago.

4 coacheshad Sepsis in the relegation season from the Superliga: Bernd Storck, Valentin Suciu, Dorinel Munteanu and Csaba Laszlo

“I was told by my colleagues who were on the bus. There were a few players who seemed to not really care that the team was relegated”

– Sepsi's demotion is absolutely shocking. And many coaches or owners passed that on to the players. No wonder we are in a good place, we have stability, up-to-date salaries, a modern stadium, a good budget, Sepsi has been relegated…
– Let me tell you something… Unfortunately, when we lost to Slobozia and were relegated to League 2, my colleagues who were on the bus that brought the team home told me.

– That's right.
– There were a few players who didn't seem to really care that the team was relegated to League 2 and that the club fell where it fell. So maybe that's an explanation! Let's put it this way, 20% of this explanation is that we had a few players, not too many, two, three, who were not very sad.

– Disappointing and surprising.
– I don't want to blame some players who, at the moment, are no longer with us at the club. But they were largely to blame. It was also seen in the match with Slobozia, as if when we scored the second goal, the team didn't play anything at all. And in a way, I deserved the relegation! That's how it is in football, we have to move forward and from now on we have to think three times who we bring to the club and which player we rely on.

– But do you think that…
– Sometimes it doesn't matter if the player is talented, sometimes the lesser known things matter, the character of the player, first and foremost!

“Our goal is to win the championship! We will also be happy with the 2nd place”

– You are a man who does not make decisions on the nerves. Have you thought if you had made a radical decision at some point, maybe the situation was different with Sepsis?
– I think about everything. Even now, I couldn't get over the shock I received in May, but it's in vain that I now consume the energy of what would have been if, because there is nothing I can change.

– That's true.
– We have to concentrate even harder from now on, because there are still four games until the play-offs and, after that, we will have ten games, ten finals, to be able to enter directly into the first league. If, somehow, we don't succeed, then there is still the possibility of getting the third or fourth place, which we don't want, because we know very well that anyway there is a big difference between the second league and the first league.

– The first two places are ideal.
– With what batch we have and what else we have brought, we must definitely get the first two places. I, personally, will also talk to the boys before we leave for Antalya and our goal is to win the championship! Otherwise, you are happy if you won the second league or took second place. Naturally, we are also happy if we take second place, that we enter the first league, but it seems like it is a bonus if you manage to win the championship.

There are seven points between Corvinul Hunedoara and our team. If we reach the play-offs, we will have two direct matches with Corvinul, so it is not excluded that we can win the League 2 championship

Laszlo Dioszegi, Sepsis patron

“I said from the start that Metaloglobus will be relegated. The big enigma is who will be next to them”

– Was the financial damage great with the relegation?
– It's normal! There were some sponsors who withdrew. Plus, with what's happening in the country, it's going to be very, very difficult for every team. Companies pay a much higher tax than before, so I don't know how many companies will support football teams. They have somewhere to put their money… We hope that, by re-entering the first league, apart from the money from televisions, the sponsors will also return. We want a championship in which we do not fear relegation.

– Do you still have the strength to watch League 1? What do you think of the ranking?
– The current season is very interesting. There are some teams that will fight until the last breath. There are eight good teams and there are eight teams that will fight to avoid relegation.

– How do you see the relegation battle?
– I'm not the type to talk about other teams, but I, from the start, when I started the championship, I said that a team, in my opinion, and let the Metaloglobus people forgive me, I said that they would be relegated.

– I'm in last place now.
– They didn't bring any big names. We know very well that there the salaries are as they are and I think so, that Metaloglobus will be relegated. The big enigma is who will be next to them and who will be the teams that will play the play-off. This championship is going to be very, very interesting.

“I don't remember anything, but I won't abandon Sepsi as long as I live!”

– FCSB and CFR Cluj are not in the play-off now. Is this also a big surprise from your point of view?
– FCSB has some players who have the power and who want to enter the play-offs. This year, I don't see CFR Cluj in the play-offs, because it has a rather large handicap.

– They also lost important players.
– We know very well that there, too, things are not as they should be for a team that intends to win the championship. This is my prediction: CFR will not enter the top six.

CFR Cluj – FCSB

– After the match with Slobozia, I suspect that your road to Sfântu Gheorghe was the hardest road you could travel.
– I had a plane from Bucharest, I was going to Budapest. I already had some meetings there, in Budapest, the next day and I had the ticket. I can tell you only one thing: I don't remember anything, not even how I got on the plane.

– Really?!
– I know that the plane left from Băneasa, it was strange, because recently the plane only left from Otopeni. This much I know, that I entered Baneasa, but I no longer know how I boarded the plane, how I landed, how I arrived in Budapest. So it was such a big shock and it took a very long time to, so to speak, put a smile back on my face.

– During all these months did you think, Mr. Dioszegi, to say stop and you were turned away?
– In no case did I have it in my head, absolutely not, to think that I was retiring from my club. It's like the child gets a bad grade, a 4, and you tell him that he's not your child anymore. I didn't think about retirement! If, somehow, we don't have sponsors with us, we don't have money from television and so on, we go to the second league, God forbid!, the third, but there can be no question of being abandoned as long as I live!

Unirea Slobozia – Sepsi Sf. Gheorghe 2-1

• They scored: Pospelov (15, 75) / El Sawy (68)

Unirea Slobozia (4-2-3-1): Krell – Dorobanțu, Blazek, Pospelov, Şerbănica – Perianu (81 M. Lupu), Akhmatov – Afalna, Purece (65 Arabuli), Aganovic (73 Bărbută) – Vojtus (81 Coada)
Reserves: D. Rusu, Medina, Ibrian, C. Toma, I. Dinu, M. Lemnaru, Yusov, Vlăsceanu
Coach: Adrian Mihalcea

Sepsis (4-4-2): Niczuly – Otelita (69 D. Oroian), Ninaj, Simic, Dumitrescu – Siger (46 S. Mailat), Matei (87 Skorup), Mino, Neskovic (61 El Sawy) – M. Coman (46 Babunsky), Oberlin
reserves: Gyence, F. Stefan, M. Tamas, Kallaku, Draghiceanu
Coach: Csaba Laszlo

• Referee: Sebastian Colțescu
• ASSISTANT: Radu Adrian Ghinguleac and Marius Badea
• VAR referee: Andrei Chivulete
• Assistant VAR: Cristina Mariana Tandafir

How does the current League 2 standings look like?