Szabolcs Schön: I still need to gain three or four kilos of muscle

– Ten games, seventeen points, and a fourth place. Is it the reality?
– After the European Championship, the majority of people expected us to reach second place in Group I at the end of the World Cup qualifying series, and we set ourselves the same goal. I'm sorry that we did not succeed – 21-year-old Dallas forward, Szabolcs Schön told our newspaper. – As far as reality is concerned, if we had played better football in those two games against Albania, if we had focused more there, we could have earned more points. In that case, it would have been possible to talk about the second place, but unfortunately, it turned out differently. However, I'm glad that the result and the performance shown in the last two games were good... since it's better to finish the group stage with two victories.

– In the fall, painful defeats and away feats alternated one another. What happened in the locker room afterward?
– The mood after the home game against Albania and the mood after the away match against England cannot be compared. After we lost at the Puskás Arena, we sat in the dressing room devastated, were sad and angry. We knew it wasn't acceptable to not earn a single point in two games. We were all hurt by those two defeats, and seeing the final result of the group, we can see how much we miss those points. However, we should not be ashamed of the results we produced at Wembley and in Warsaw, and we did not reach the draw or the victory with playing defense football, we took advantage of the opportunity in both matches.

– Overall, was the second place close, or did it seem far away?
– We should have done a lot better in the two games, so it was rather close.

– What did the national team get better at during fall qualifiers?
– After the European Championship, we talked a lot about the fact that the next step in development would be to be able to perpetuate the game shown in the three group matches. Speaking of defense, we more or less performed the same as in the summer, and apart from the second half of the home game against England, they did not rush through us in any of the games, our defense wasn't a passthrough. Of course, there were mistakes, but I feel the basic is secure, and our utilization of opportunities was also great.

– According to the Nemzeti Sport ratings, you were the best of the national team in the World Cup qualifiers.
– Firstly, I'm glad I could my debut for the national team in the summer, before my 21st birthday. I did everything in my power to help the team and I feel like I didn't cause disappointment in most of the games. I tried to follow Marco Rossi's instructions and I think I was able to add my part to the team's game in attack. But I still have to improve in the duels. I'm not one of the 80- to 85-kilogram, bare-muscle footballers, and when I was in a physical fight, I could feel that I need to gain three or four more kilograms of muscle.

– Dallas, which plays in the MLS, didn't make the league playoffs, so the season ended for you. How do you spend the rest of the year?
– The club gave us two weeks off, so I'm trying to take advantage of that and relax a bit. After that, I'm going to start training: running and working out in the gym are included in the program. We would like to be in our best shape possible for the preparation starting on January 16.

Translated by Vanda Orosz