How’s it going on guys and welcome back to the ABTFM blog. Today, we are back with another chapter of the Fiorentina Journey. In the last chapter, we played against some big teams like Lazio, Juventus and Inter Milan. In the league itself, we were sitting at the 2nd position with 1 point behind Napoli. On the bright side, we made it to the Final of the Italian Cup after beating Inter in the 2 legs Semi Final. Today, we are back in the league. We are now pushing towards the end of the season. Without further ado, let’s jump straight in to the Fiorentina Journey.
vs Bottom Half
After the 2-2 draw against Inter, we then had some fairly easy games against the team at the bottom half of the table. The first game was an away game against Lecce, who was at the bottom of the table. Matteo Politano scored from the penalty spot at the 26th minute. To be honest, our performance wasn’t good enough, but we still managed to get the 3 points.
The second game was against Brescia. It was a home game. We played well in this game with Dusan Vlahovic scored the opener at the 16th minute. Our captain, German Pezzella then scored a header at the 50th minute. Brescia got no chance in this game. Matteo Politano once again stepped up and delivered a great performance by providing 2 assists.
The next game was an away game against Sassuolo. We did poorly out there. It was a 0-0 draw. Dusan Vlahovic received a 5.8 rating in the game, the lowest rating we ever had in this season so far. He missed a couple of big chances in front of the goal. Until the 80th minute, I just can’t stand anymore, and I had to sub him off. Thilo Kehrer was very good in this game. He created so many chances to our front three, but none of them were in the back of the net.
The fourth and final game was against Empoli. We won the game with only one goal. Matteo Politano scored a tap in goal at the 54th minute. In this match, I made the decision of playing another young prospect we had in our team – Stefano Forgione. He was exceptional in his debut. He created 2 chances, made 2 key passes and provided the winning goal’s assist. He was definitely enjoying himself out there and I hope he will continue deliver the same performance throughout the season.
League Table
Now, let’s have a look at the league table after 31 games. We are still second place with 67 points. The current leader, Napoli has got 68 points, just 1 point ahead of us. We had a draw against Sassuolo, fortunately, Napoli did not take their chance and also had a draw at their 30th league game. Milan is obviously putting pressure on us with 65 points, only 2 points behind of us. Arguably, the top 3 is already fixed in this season. It seems like we are going to compete the title with Napoli and Milan.
vs Atalanta
Our 32nd league game is against Atalanta. To be honest, I am very nervous because in the first half of the season, Atalanta hammered us in our home turf. Today, we are going to face them in the Gewiss Stadium. Of course, we are sending out our strongest 11 out there. Nicola Tagliaferri is back to the starting line-up, Weston McKennie, Ryan Gravenberch and Rolando Mandragora the midfield trio will remain unchanged.
We have done it! What a massive win it is! After playing 90 minutes in Gewiss Stadium, we successfully beat Atalanta 2-1. The game was very intense. All 3 goals are scored in the first half between 41st minute and 46th minute. Atalanta scored the first goal with Alejandro Gomez made a beautiful long pass finding Luis Muriel. The Colombian striker took his chance and scored the one-on-one against our goalkeeper. 2 minutes later, Nicola Tagliaferri won the ball at the left flank. He then made an insane dribble into the box and hit the ball into the back of the net, 1-1! Right before the half time whistle, Thilo Kehrer hit an early cross from the right, Dusan Vlahovic volleyed the ball into the bottom corner, 2-1 for Fiorentina. At the 80th minute, Atalanta had a chance to score a penalty after Mario Hermoso committed a foul in the box. However, Alejandro Gomez failed to keep the nerve and sent the ball over the bar.
It was a very massive win for us against Atalanta. Good things did not end here. Crotone, who was at the 18th position in the table, beat Napoli 4-3 at home! One of their players was sent off at the 89th minute and the score line was 3-3. However, Crotone managed to score the winning goal at the 91st minute. With just 10 men, the underdogs proved themselves were the better team in that game. Thanks to Crotone, we are now at the top of the league with 2 points ahead of Napoli!
Title Race
The next game against Sampdoria was a 2-0 victory for us. Marco Benassi scored an absolute screamer outside the box, and Nicola Tagliaferri got himself in the scoresheet again. Napoli won their game as well, but Milan only took 1 point from his opponent this time. With only 5 games left, 4 teams are currently battling for the title.
In the news itself, it says that Juventus 10-year reign as champions is at the end. I am so proud that we are here making history. Even though we are not the champions right now, or we might finish second or third in the league, I am still very happy with the boys, especially what we have achieve in this season. We are the Italian Cup finalist, as well as the title contenders.
Anyways, the last 5 games, we are facing Roma, Torino, Milan, Bologna and Parma. I wouldn’t say this is easy. Roma could be very difficult to play against even though they are at the 12th position right now. Torino might be an easy game. The game against Milan is surely the title decider match. I am not too worried about the Bologna game, but Parma could be fairly difficult as well as they are having a good season. Now, we are just going to play 3 games – Roma, Torino and Milan.
vs Roma
As expected, it was a tough game against Roma. We failed to collect 3 points from the Olimpico. The game finished 0-0. Both teams failed to score a single goal as well. Our front three weren’t clinical enough, they missed a lot of big chances, and eventually I subbed off all three of them. We had 11 shots and 7 on target, meanwhile all the shots were very bad. Roma’s defence had a solid game, unfortunate for us. Hopefully, next game would be better.
vs Torino
What a comeback against Torino here! We won the 2-1 with a dominant performance. Dusan Vlahovic, our hero, scored the winning goal at 91st minute! The first half was very boring, both teams were playing poorly. Torino scored the opener at the 60th minute with Christian Capone scoring a header. At the 71st minute, we are awarded with a penalty and Matteo Politano stepped up and scored the equaliser. Right until the end of the game, we had a corner. Dusan Vlahovic then won the header at the far post after a bad clearance was made by Torino’s defender. Massive 3 points!
The title race is surely heating up! At the same time when we beat Torino 2-1, Napoli failed to get 3 points against Cagliari, who is at the 19th position in the league. That is surely a good news for us. On the other hand, Milan has dropped to the 4th position. Lazio continue their good form, winning 2 games in a row, climbs up to the 3rd position with 70 points. Next game, we are going to play Milan at the San Siro, let’s see how we do in that game!
vs Milan
Oh, my, god. We lost the game 2-0 to Milan. Lucas Moura received a red card at the 12th minute, however, that did not change the fact that Milan was playing superbly. Wilfred Zaha scored the opener in just 7 minutes into the game. We then tried our best to create chances, but Milan’s defence was having a great, great time. The winning goal came at the 57th minute, Rafa scored a volley after receiving the cross from Ricardo Rodriguez. We had more shots and shots on target than Milan, but we still lost the game. Once again, our attack wasn’t clinical enough. I think we must have a plan B or even a new tactics in next season.
League Table
Back to league table again, we are so, so lucky. Napoli failed to collect 3 points from Genoa at their home turf. For now, we are still at the top of the league with 77 points, following by Napoli with 76 points. Milan are back to 3rd position after beating us 2-0 with 71 points. Lazio is at the 4th position with also 71 points. In the Europa League qualification spot, we have Juventus and Inter with 67 points, while Parma is sitting at the 7th position with 58 points, 3 points ahead of Atalanta.
Conclusion
Only 2 games left to play in the league. Next chapter, we are going to take a break from the league because we are going to play Lazio in the Italian Cup Final. I hope we could at least deliver a better performance. Last month, we faced Lazio and we lost 4-0. This time, we are going to be more careful and hopefully we can win the cup!
Anyways, we already achieved our season target which is qualify for the Champions League. Yes, we are back to the European Competition again next season! So, right now, we just have to try our best to win the Italian Cup and the league!
COME ON, LA VIOLA!
I hope you guys enjoy reading the Fiorentina Journey and don’t forget to follow me on Twitter @abt_fm to join the discussion of football. Also, do check out my other series in my blog like the Tactics Recreation and the Lyon Journey. Once again, thank you for your support and I will see you guys in the next chapter. Take care!
ABT Football Manager 