Lopes eager to see Hoops supporters enjoy title party
By Hayden Moore
SHAMROCK Rovers defender Roberto Lopes has insisted that the defending League of Ireland champions are determined to celebrate a league title in front of their supporters.
The Hoops will open the defence of their Premier Division crown by way of a Dublin derby when they welcome St Patrick’s Athletic to Tallaght Stadium on March 19, but not before they take on Dundalk in the President’s Cup the week beforehand.
Shamrock Rovers defender Roberto Lopes insists the desire to see the club’s supporters enjoy the title party they were denied last year is only fuelling the team even further
“It still feels like we’re only getting started,” Roberto Lopes told The Echo.
“See last year we didn’t really get to celebrate winning the league with there being no fans because of the restrictions.
“So that is giving us that much more motivation, even outside of playing, to be able to do it again.
“Winning in front of the fans is what keeps you going, so hopefully we can celebrate a league title with them this year.”
Stephen Bradley’s squad will come together for the first time on Friday for a “gruelling” group session to kickstart their pre-season training.
“We’ve been kind of doing a few bits ourselves in the gym, but we don’t officially start until Friday when we get in a gruelling hill run” said the Crumlin man.
“Once we get through the hill run, we’re back on to the pitch again next week.
“We’re lucky in the sense that we’re able to work away, having a bit of interaction with the lads and I’m looking forward now to getting back on the pitch. We’re raring to go.
“The first week is all about prepping the body, getting the legs and the body right.
“The second week we’re doing a lot of tough running and trying to find our touch again.
“By the third week we’ll be at a decent level of fitness and you’ll start to notice the quality of games increasing because we’ll be putting more work into our speed and agility training.”
This week, as part of an outreach initiative by Shamrock Rovers, Lopes has started a video series on how he manages nutrition.
Through ‘Eat Like Pico’, Lopes will be creating a ‘how to’ style of video each week in the build-up to the start of the season.
Lopes has a Personal Training (PT) qualification, which included some work around nutrition, and with his father Carlos a chef by trade, the writing was on the wall.
“We genuinely do miss the fans and it’s another way to get the players engaging with the fans even though we can’t be together,” he says.
“It’s massively important to connect and you do see that with the likes of our homework club now as well.
“Eat Like Pico’ is a way for us to touch base with our fans and have that little bit of comedy too.
“I can take a bit of stick if something is maybe too healthy or if I’m making something they don’t like, and it can be a bit of craic.
“I have a PT qualification. We would have touched on nutrition with some of the modules and look my dad is a chef as well – it just made sense.”
At international level, Roberto represents his father’s national team Cape Verde.
As is tradition on the islands, the nickname Pico was given to Roberto when he was a child.
“My dad just started to call me Pico when I was a child. It means ‘strong man’,” Roberto explains and this is what the title of the video series is in reference to – Eat Like Pico.
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