Romero: ‘Dybala and Ronaldo handshake changed my life’

On-loan Juventus defender Cristiano Romero revealed his first experiences in Serie A and how facing Cristiano Ronaldo and Paulo Dybala changed his life.

The 22-year-old was speaking on Instagram about his first season with Genoa and how he had to jump in at the deep end shortly after arriving from Argentina.

“I could have immediately gone on loan to Crotone in Serie B,” he began, “but they advised me to do the pre-season with Genoa.

“I played friendly matches against Zenit and an Austrian team and then Mister (coach Davide) Ballardini came to me telling me that he liked me and he kept me in the team.”

A change of coaches meant that Ivan Juric took over the Genoa bench and gave Romero his first taste of Serie A.

“Juric was a little crazy, but in a good way,” he continued, “Crazy in the sense that he was special in terms of his ideas and characteristics for everything.

“He told me that I would play, he told me that as we were arriving at the pitch.

“When we were about to come on, the emotion had been incredible, to see Dybala and Cristiano Ronaldo: I could not believe it – Since they shook my hand my life has changed.

“My teammates told me to be calm and that it would be all right, and in fact it was a good game, mine and the whole team. From there I only missed one and it was a year of incredible growth.”

“In the second game I scored my first goal, within five games I integrated, I had learned the language and I improved little by little in two really great years of growth.

“Today I am at Genoa and I am very well, they’ve treated me very well.”

Source: juvefc