In the wake of Sampdoria’s untimely crashing out of the UEFA Champions League to Werder Bremen last week, there must have been few supporters of the Italian game who were left scratching their heads, flabbergasted as to exactly what had gone wrong for the Genoa outfit.
Up 3-0 and 4-3 on aggregate over the German outfit, the Blucerchiati looked to be headed for the group stage as Serie A’s fourth and final representative in 2010, when a last gasp Markus Rosenberg strike in the 93rd minute changed everything. Level on aggregate, the match headed into extra time where Claudio Pizarro found the score-sheet and silenced the home crowd, effectively sealing Werder Bremen’s progress to the group stage, and giving the German Bundesliga the upper hand over Italy’s top flight in the two leagues’ on-going UEFA coefficient battle.
No, for Serie A fans—and neutrals, for that matter—Sampdoria’s disheartening collapse could not have evoked sentiments of much shock or surprise. In fact, it is specifically these kinds of disappointing performances and uninspiring runs of play that supporters of the Italian game have come to expect over the past few years, as the erstwhile verve and charm of Serie A seemingly continues to wane.
It is true that Inter completed an historic treble-winning season last year, which culminated in May with the hoisting of their third European crown. But one club’s unprecedented capturing of a triad of trophies isn’t enough to conceal or make up for the innumerable defects of an entire league.
Gone is the exciting, zesty style of play of yesteryear, the previously evident level of unwavering competitiveness, and perhaps most crucially, the highly coveted third UEFA coefficient spot currently and tantalizingly out of reach. Though the real crux of these issues plaguing Italy’s top flight division can be traced back to what its league and every other league like it on this planet is most fundamentally based on: its players. Simply put, Serie A’s fall from grace can best be attributed to its lack of marquee talent.
But that was last Tuesday. My how things can change in just a week.
While pundits in the UK have lamented a rather uneventful transfer window for their top division, what with Tottenham’s coup in swooping up Dutch midfielder Rafael van der Vaart from Real Madrid for a cool £8m being deemed the most high-profiled move of any English club, it has been quite the antithesis in Italy, whose clubs have been involved in a flurry of deals. There were last season’s runners-up Roma who secured the services of the reportedly rejuvenated Brazilian Adriano, as well as Marco Borriello in a loan deal from Milan. There were Juventus who, following an abysmal campaign last term, have added a trio of loanees to their ranks in Alberto Aquilani (Liverpool), Armand Traoré (Arsenal), and Fabio Quagliarella (Napoli), not to mention the plucking of enigmatic Serbian midfielder Miloš Krasić from CSKA Moscow. Even Genoa managed to make a splash in the transfer market agreeing to terms with Portuguese starting goalkeeper Eduardo from Braga, Brazilian right back Rafinha from Schalke, and mercurial front man Luca Toni from Bayern Munich.
So…where are the big names again? Oh, that’s right. Excuse me—for those we need not travel far from the home ground of the reigning champions. Actually, they can be found playing for an opposing club that shares the same building.
AC Milan. The most successful club in Europe this side of Real Madrid having won seven European Cups, no outfit represents Serie A quite like the Rossoneri. Milan begin each and every season with the onerous task of upholding the club’s legacy in continuing to reassert their dominance over the rest of Europe as one of the world’s most prosperous outfits. But times of late have been tough on owner Silvio Berlusconi’s side, their last major trophy coming in the 2007 Champions League Final victory over Liverpool, and before that, a solitary Scudetto for the decade back in 2004. The club’s struggles have become even more apparent these past few years, with a fifth place league finish in 2008 and a 7-2 aggregate mauling courtesy of Manchester United in the round of sixteen of last year’s Champions League being its too most glaringly egregious shortcomings (I need not even mention that the club hasn’t finished higher than third in the Italian table since 2005, but I did it anyway).
However, nowadays there is a new scent emanating from the Rossoneri side of the San Siro, and, like their Milanese rivals, it is one that reeks of both freshness and promise (one need only examine Milan’s new kits to see that). Newly appointed manager Massimiliano Allegri has brought in versatile Greek defender Sokratis Papastathopoulos, Ghanian marksman Kevin-Prince Boateng, and perhaps the signing of the summer in Swedish striker Zlatan Ibrahimović, who arrives at the Giuseppe Meazza on loan from Barcelona. But the former Cagliari boss wasn’t finished.
Allegri finally put an end to Robinho’s tumultuous relationship with Manchester City when the manager roped in the glittering Brazilian forward, who was desperately seeking a change of scenery from Eastlands, for a bargain price of just over £18m. The move now gives Allegri the option of deploying a potentially menacing lozenge of attackers in Alexandre Pato, Ibrahimović, Ronaldinho, and now Robinho. And amazingly, none of the newcomers—with the exception of Boateng, who made a late cameo as a substitute—even featured in the 4-0 thrashing of newly-promoted Lecce at the weekend that saw goals from Thiago Silva, Fiippo Inzaghi, and a brace Pato. Though it is unlikely that he will employ the attacking diamond up front, the newly-acquired weapons and reinforcements at Allegri’s disposal are significant to say the least, and in due time, the rest of the league will be forced to take note (if nothing else, it makes an already mouthwatering handful of fixtures in Group G of the Champions League featuring Milan, Real Madrid, Ajax, and Auxerre look even tastier).
Not since Kaká departed the Rossoneri for Real Madrid in June of 2009 have Serie A fans had an elite superstar to call their own. Just over a year later, and the monikers of several world-class performers have flocked to, and now make their new homes in, the unpredictable world of Italian football. At Inter, there are the ever-bourgeoning cognomens of Milito, Eto’o, Sneijder, and Maicon, and on the other side of the San Siro, the new front four of Pato, Ibrahimović, Ronaldinho, and Robinho, not to mention the aforementioned newcomers at Roma, Juve, and Genoa among others. They may not have a Ronaldo, a Rooney, or a Messi patrolling their pitches on a weekly basis, but Serie A fans can have both confidence and pride in their new imports, who could not have arrived at a better time. After all, each of them now belongs to Italian football, and in their hands—at their feet, really—they hold the ability to rescue, restore and revitalize a decaying league. As always though, it is the results, and not the names themselves, that will do the talking, and we can’t wait to watch all of it unfold.
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