Friday, April 22 nd, 2016
Mission  |   Team  |   Contact Us    
The Season's first half: 5 things we'd love to forget as soon as possible
Milan's nightmarish months, Mazzarri's endless complaints, the bad luck of Napoli and Fiorentina. An absurd ban for football fans. What went wrong in this first part of the season for Serie A clubs
by Federico Formica
Milan disaster. At the beginning of the season no one with a glimmer of intuition could seriously think that Milan was an invincible army. But the magnitude of the ongoing failure is striking even the more pessimist: 22 points, 5 games won out of 19, 30 goals conceded. The endless fall toward hell coincided with an unprecedented change in Milan's history: Barbara Berlusconi, Silvio's daughter, started a war against the vice-president Adriano Galliani, who announced his resignation on November 29th. This feud in front of the media ratified a total failure also in the communication area.

 

Silvio Berlusconi convinced his old friend to change idea. In the new arrangement, Barbara is CEO of the management area while Galliani is CEO of the sporting area. The first consequence was the resignation of Ariedo Braida, general manager from 1986 to 2002 and sporting director since 2002.

 

But, at the earliest opportunity, that balance broke up: after Sassuolo-Milan 4-3, Barbara Berlusconi virtually fired the coach Massimiliano Allegri with fire-ball declarations to the news agency Ansa. Allegri, who has always been backed by Galliani, was fired by a person who has a totally different task and should not meddle in issues related with the coach.

 

In the winter transfer market Milan was able to ridicule itself once again: the forward Alessandro Matri has been sent on loan to Fiorentina. Five months ago Matri cost €11M. Since then, he only scored once. Eleven millions that, maybe, could have been spent for a decent defender. The now coach Clarence Seedorf has a huge task in front of him.


Inter's anonymity. The 2013-2014 season should have coincided with the Renaissance. But the New Era seems far ahead: the team still has not a clear identity, the playing style is quite boring and the arrival of Erick Thohir has not changed much. Walter Mazzarri, who left Napoli to make a step up in his career, probably hoped he'd have better players and bigger investments.

Every time Inter drew or lost a match, the coach complains about the referee, or bad luck. But probably he should worry about his team's playing style, which is still poor. OK, it's not Mourinho's Inter (and the only top player left, Fredy Guarin, could leave the club in January), but the expectations on Walter Mazzarri were different, with Rodrigo Palacio to save the joint.

If Thohir buys a new forward, will Mazzarri play with two strikers on the pitch? So far, playing with two forwards has seemed like a blasphemy to the Tuscan coach.

 

Fan's Ban. The current season will be remembered for the war between the fans (or, at least, the most tenacious ones) and the Italian football federation (FIGC). In theory, the rule is clear: if a bunch of people insult the opposite fans, or the city where they come from, the part of the stadium where they are is disqualified for the next game. The problem is that, in Italy, chants like Milano in fiamme (Burn Milan), Napoli colera (Cholera to Naples) or Genova puzza di pesce (Genova stinks of fish) are often not perceived as racist, but as provincial skirmishes. A part of the Italian press criticized the “territorial discrimination rule”, also because it is deeply unfair. If 200 fans make a “forbidden” chant, why should you punish 10,000 people, banning them from going to the stadium?

The lowest point was reached before the derby Inter-Milan. The FIGC disciplinary commission banned the Inter fans because someone made racist chants during the previous match against Napoli (a match which was played in Naples). The Milan ultras threatened to desert the stadium in solidarity with their lifelong rivals. In front of the possibility of a derby televised all over the world without fans to sing and without coreographies, the Italian federation decided to suspend the ban. What will happen in the next weeks?

 

Fiorentina's bad luck. One cannot say that Fiorentina is a lucky club. In the last season, la Viola was thrown out by the third place (which entails the possibility to play the next Champions League) due to a wrong referee's decision in the final match, which brought Milan in the main European competition. In the last months, the Della Valle family – owners of the club – decided to raise the bar signing two authentic top players: Giuseppe “Pepito” Rossi and Mario Gomez.

 

The German striker endured three games (with two goals) before a knee injury. The problem turned to be worse than expected, so the little Pepito had to carry all the offensive play on his shoulders. And he succeeded: the Italian-American scored 14 goals and he's the current Serie A top scorer. Not bad for a player whose last entire season was 2010-2011 with Villarreal (36 caps, 18 goals) due to many knee injuries. But it seems that Pepito has not extinguished his debt with the bad luck: on January 5th, he suffered another serious injury to his knee and he'll have to stay out for 4 months at least. Now Fiorentina is waiting for Mario Gomez, but in meantime they had to sign Alessandro Matri on loan from Milan. Well, he's not exactly the same as the Rossi and Mario Gomez...

 

Champions League injustice. If there's one team that would deserve to continue in the Champions League, that's Napoli. The Benitez's side displayed a beautiful football, beating Arsenal and Borussia Dortmund at San Paolo stadium and Marseille in both the legs. The toughest group of the Champions League ended with three clubs together at 12 points: Arsenal, Borussia Dortmund and Napoli.

 

But the Azzurri were kicked out from the competition for the away goals against the German side: they lost 1-3 at Signal Iduna while they won 2-1 at San Paolo. Not enough. It's a real pity for Italian football because the Partenopei are the Italian team which better fit in a competition like Champions League. They play an offensive football and they attack with at least 6 men; Benitez's team is always looking for a goal more and, in this season, they have more European experience thanks to the Spaniard coach and the three ex Real Madrid players, Raul Albiol, Gonzalo Higuaín and José María Callejón. Now in the Europa League, will Napoli be the same team we admired in UCL as well?

 

Thanks to our reviewer Lorenzo Franceschi Bicchierai

Thursday, January 16 th, 2014
For discussion of this topic and many more about Serie A, join R/ItalianFootball