State of the.. Serie A

By: Christopher | July 7th, 2009

At Alex’s suggestion (thanks), I’m going to go over some general football thoughts as a more in depth ‘get to know the new guy.’ I’ll try to keep it brief:

Serie A
The coming years of Serie A should be really interesting– especially in terms of finance. The split with Serie B is a huge step in attaining the league wealth that the EPL enjoys. This makes me pretty damn happy seeing as I am not a happy camper when it comes to the EPL– my roommate last year and next year is damned Chelsea fan (the CL knockout duel of basically Serie A vs. EPL was unbearable)– still pondering a roommate change ; / When I think of Chelsea and the EPL I think debt — a couple days ago I read an article that 2/3 of EPL teams are in debt, a total of which is estimated at 3 billion pounds, of which 1/3 is shared between Man U, Chelsea, and Liverpool alone. The point is, along with greater wealth comes the need for greater fiscal responsibility. Chelsea are years behind their schedule in balancing their books, but then again who is on schedule in these times? What I’m trying to say is the Serie A, are closer to this feat then our English counterparts but don’t have the recent results to show it. But the pressure is on them with obscene amounts of spending to uphold popularity, I am dying to know the financial effect of maybe one of the EPL big 4 not making it past CL group stages. The split of Serie A will also put more financial pressure on merchandising and ticket sales, two more things the English do better. Lets face it, Serie A team appeal (outside the big 4) is mostly regional, that may be a broad statement but when you consider mid table EPL teams doing foreign tours you can see what I’m trying to get at. Our need to fill the stadiums shows in Serie A attendance figures compared to the EPL. Many Serie A teams are sharing stadiums, but being in the process of new constructions, we are taking the right steps. A brief stop at the typical online soccer shops will tell you a lot about the state of merchandising. For example at Foxsoccershop.com why can I buy a shittastic West Brom Jersey, yet my only option for Napoli is a t-shirt? All of my above comments can be seen as lame for they are only relevant if we are indeed to follow in the steps of EPL and the way of big spenders. Money is all saddening to discuss in this sense though because in the end I’d like the sport to be about more– such as great youth development, coaching, e.t.c. What I’m saying is it would be nice for the footballing structure to change in a way where regional competition is enhanced. In my opinion I feel that Platini has taken some great steps to make it as such, especially with the homegrown rule for qualifying CL teams.

Teams I like outside of Napoli
Juventus is another team I like, although this is based on childhood exposure rather than real logic. I guess you could make the connection that what drew me to them then, still has appeal now, and that is a great youth sector, and ADP loyalty. Dare I say this…I’ll probably hit myself later, or just delete this at some point…but I do respect Inter style football in a particular sense. I say this as I side with Camoranesi’s criticism of Serie A as sometimes being over tactical. Don’t get me wrong, Serie A is my favorite league, you have to do more than just be able to kick a ball and run– sorry Tiago, but Claudio Ranieri for example, often took this tacticality too far. I guess what I’m trying to say is goals are known to be harder to come by in Serie A compared to the EPL which is not a bad thing by any means, but you can be tactical and play to win at the same time. In the end, football is the “beautiful game,” and you have to play it, its about the enjoyment for the fans, the daringness of the players. So when I watched Ranieri- to continue the example- leave Giovinco on the bench in the dying embers of a hard fought game that looks to be a draw- to bring on CDM Poulsen I get mad. Meanwhile, Mourinho is switching it up to a 4-2-4 in that situation to try to go for it, cause going for it is what it’s all about. That is the only light I view Inter positively in (Phew thank goodness the Inter talk is over)…

$Can\'t Wait$

Back to Napoli and Donadoni
I like Donadoni, I think Italian media was a little too bitter with him. I don’t know what would have happened if he was the one who was in charge at the Confed Cup, for starters hell would have risen from the peninsula and Donadoni would have been in the middle of the fiery flames. Instead Lippi just walks out from the wreckage with no qualms about it. I liked his management, his subs were usually effective. Didn’t get to see him too much at Livorno, a little at Genoa, but I suppose the real test was Euros and I’m not sure that he passed with flying colors. Seemed that with the group of midfielders he called up for his formation that he had a choice between the AC Milan midfield trio, the core of a team that was at the time not on form to say the least, or the Roma midfield, which was, well, the good one. He chose AC Milan, still not sure why. But he got it together and managed to get the attacking football in and I was satisfied with it, the Italy- Romania game was a massive onslaught of shots on the Romanian goal, and the game with the Dutch could have changed on a dime if Toni’s goal wasn’t immediately ruled incorrectly offside. Last half of the season I liked the effort of team despite results, I think Donadoni can’t be judged to heavily seeing as he was cleaning up Reja’s mess and did not have the same players available to him that helped make Napoli great in the beginning of the season. In terms of incoming players I would love to see an Italian LB flourish at Napoli, especially PDC, but Modesto would do. Overall I would love to see more Italian talent injected into the squad– Quags you rule. But my main concern is formation. Donadoni has a suspicious track record with the 4-3-3 he is talking about, or maybe its more that the 4-3-3 is not really the Italian way. I know this has been a redundant criticism after the long past Euros and now the Confed Cup, but I think this season we are really starting to see the rebirth of the trequartista. I know this ‘in the hole’ position has lately been out of favor in England while usually present in Italy, but now it seems like its really taking hold. We saw evidence to the contrary in the Confederations Cup– Italy anchored at the back launching long balls up to a 3 man strike force that couldn’t hold on to them, i.e, not playing the tactical play through the midfield game that we need. Interestingly, in the U-21 tourny, we saw a microcosm of this in Casiraghi’s formation selections. The 4-3-3 in the games it was used saw really poor linkage between the midfield and the attacking trio, while a mid game switch to a modified 4-4-2 showed the effectiveness of the trequartista’s free-roaming role in the Italian game. Giovinco linked play beautifully from great holding midfield performances of Cigarini and Marchisio to attackers Acquafresca and Candreva. Lazio (Foggia), Roma (Totti), Milan (Dinho), Juve (Diego/ Giovinco), are just a few who will likely be fielding a modified 4-4-2 / 4-3-1-2 with their respective trequartistas in mind. I think this formation would fit well to our current squad of players, without necessarily needing another winger that De La speaks of. Cigarini, and a healthy Gargano will be the part of a great anchoring force to set Hamsik in a free roaming role behind Quags. Hailed as the next Pirlo (not really sure about that one yet), Cigarini has spoke often of his preferred role in front of the defense and had some great games doing so in with the Azzurini. Now I’m too excited for next season…I’ll have to stop here.

Forza Napoli!