The Turin Tragedy

By: Kshitiz | October 9th, 2007

Result
Torino 1 Sampdoria 0
(Corini 88′)

There is no better way to say this, we were the poorer team, didnt dominate play, we were down one man, and were made to look like this stupid rabbit in front of Toro, but still Mazzari described this as a good performance. In fact, he considered this as one of the best performances of the season. If that is so, especially against teams that are perennial relegation fodder, then we have a very tough year ahead of us, forget the talk of Europe. Dropping points against them is simply inexcusable, either home or away.

Match Stats
All my pre-match predictions went wrong, Belluci didnt score a brace, he didn’t even play. Rosina did not threaten and we did not win. Belluci was probably injured in the warm-up leading up to the match. So he was substituted by nobody. That is to say we played a highly unusual 3-5-1-1 with Montella upfront. The Granata were their usual self, but had Recoba on the bench and had lost Comotto to injury.The starting XI was
Mirante
Campagnaro Sala Lucchini
Zenoni Sammarco Palombo Volpi Pieri
DelVecchio
Montella

Clearly, we were not looking to score many goals and wanted to keep it tight in the engine room.Delvecchio missed two decent chances in the early stages of the game.The engine room looked leaky throughout the game, especially after the stupid sending off that Volpi received just before the break. Till then, they had no man advantage and things were pretty even. So after that non existent elbow by Volpi, and some nice theatrics by Rubin, we started feeling the one-man disadvantage. Torino had more shots on goal, way more shots. 19 as compared to our 8. That speaks volumes about our game, we were simply toothless going forward. Torino had the better possesion, which was expected after Baby-eyed Volpi was sent off. But we still had a chance to salvage a point, which was enough for my money after this showing. But it was never tobe, as they equalised in a crowded situation, which can only be described as a typical EPL goal buildup. Corino hanging on to a Recoba shot in the 88th minute and our hopes of getting a point all but drowned. Except for a good perfromance by Palombo, and some deft touches by Peter Pan Cassano who was brought on as a late subsitute. He almost converted a goal but the ball came back after being very close to going in.Mirante saved a few, including a rocket from El Chino, but Torino were very messy in front of the goal, so he didnt have much to do anyway. The solitary goal was enough for this dull game marred by theatrics from the Turin team.

What the managers had to say

Mazzari:“The red card conditioned the game and I think that up till that moment we were playing well.I think that my players played the best game of the season, at least until we were the same number of players and, despite the defeat and the elimination of Thursday, I don’t see a bad moment, but just positive things.Cassano has done very well.”

Novellino:“We played well against a very good team.I have a team of young players. We couldn’t do better than this.I’m very happy because the team is playing well. We are missing various points, but when the absent players will be back we shall do better.”

Highlights of the Game

What this result means to us

The Serie A table looks like

Team Pts Pl W D L
Inter 17 7 5 2 0
Juventus 14 7 4 2 1
Roma 14 7 4 2 1
Fiorentina 13 7 3 4 0
Genoa 12 7 3 3 1
Palermo 11 7 3 2 2
Udinese 11 7 3 2 2
Milan 10 7 2 4 1
Napoli 10 7 3 1 3
Atalanta 10 7 2 4 1
Catania 9 7 2 3 2
Sampdoria 8 7 2 2 3
Torino 7 7 1 4 2
Lazio 7 7 1 4 2
Cagliari 7 7 2 1 4
Siena 6 7 1 3 3
Parma 6 7 1 3 3
Empoli 5 7 1 2 4
Reggina 4 7 0 4 3
Livorno 2 7 0 2 5

which places us in a degrading lower-mid table position, which is quite undeserved given some good showing and the talent that we have. We just haven’t been able to get our act together, and the upcoming international break is just the time for us to sit down and regroup. These two weeks may well act as a booster for us. Hopefully we will be able to bank on a full squad, and Bellucci should be fit. Cassano should also be nearing his full fitness after his burger-eating galactico fiasco. We welcome Parma to the Luigi Ferraris and they should be easily picking for us to regain some form, after Roma just mauled them in-front of their home crowd. In the meantime, DelVecchio should start practicing his finishing skills in front of goal, probably imagining Materazzi to be the opposition goalie.

Some Random Stuff
a) Some nice memories associated with Torino