FIRST TEAM
10/22/2012

“I'm going to keep giving my all!”

For 19 year old Vincenzo Grifo, a dream was fulfilled on Friday evening. The Italian was subbed on in the 70th minute during TSG 1899 Hoffenheim's Bundesliga match against Greuther Fürth to make his league debut. achtzehn99.de spoke with Grifo about his experience.

Vincenzo, what went through your head when assistant manager Rainer Widmayer held up your jersey and signalled that you were being brought on?

I thought, why me? At that point, we were leading 2-1 and I thought Chris or Eren would have been introduced. Obviously I was a little bit nervous, but it's an amazing feeling when you come on and 20,000 fans call out your name.

You didn't take long to get into the game.

I said to myself, it's the same ball, the same pitch and the same jersey up to the name on the back of it. The biggest difference is the atmosphere inside the stadium, but as players we shouldn't be focussing on the scenery too much. After the first touch of the ball, I trusted myself more and more.

What was the first bit of feedback that Markus Babbel gave you?

It was in a joint conversation with Denis (Streker). The manager said that he was happy with us and that we should keep it up. Obviously we're going to carry on giving our all. It has always been my dream to play in the Bundesliga and maybe even in front of 80,000 fans in Dortmund.

After your 20 minute spell with the first team, did you help the U23s win on Sunday against Großaspach? What did your “old” teammates say to you?

Of course they congratulated me. I was pleased to be in the staring line-up and played 70 minutes. So overall, I guess I played 90 minutes this weekend (laughs). I've been training regularly with the first team for a good week now, but the “old” lads are still my teammates. If I don't play in the Bundesliga then I still enjoy playing for the U23s.

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