For everything to change, nothing must change. Thus wrote Tomasi di Lampedusa in “Il Gattopardo” and the Cesena fans must cling to this hope for the future. On the other hand, the signs of a break with the recent past are not so clear-cut and the classic enthusiasm that fuels the fans’ dreams of glory before each new season remains to macerate in a bitter mixture of regrets and recriminations.
Mimmo Toscano is still on the bench with whom the square has never managed to find a great feeling even if, in addition to a game and not exactly exciting results, the coach indirectly pays for a progressive skepticism towards the whole club. Not that there has been a lack of investments by the American owners in recent years, but some operational opacities and the evident disinterest in the moods and opinions of the fans have in the end been divisive. Starting with the one concerning the goalkeeper Luca Lewis, son of the managing director Robert, on whom the shadows perhaps debatable on the conflict of interest weigh, but even more the objective errors committed, costing several and decisive points in the standings.
At least in the meantime Lewis has been sold and the former AC Milan player Sebastiano Rossi, goalkeeper manager, and the goalkeeper coach Scalabrelli have also disappeared, both highly contested by the fans for a whole series of bitter pasts. With a three-card game, the equally disliked Massimo Agostini still remains in the technical area, despite the arrival of Fabio Artico as sporting director, suggesting otherwise. Finally, Lewis father who was not discouraged after the defeat in the playoffs against Lecco, is now at least in a showdown in the form of conditional trust on the part of the board.
Even if there hasn’t been the revolution that would have appeased the stomachaches of the disappointed Juventus public, perhaps something is moving. The same thing applies to the old consolidated squad where apart from the little gem Stiven Shpendi, attracted by the sirens of Empoli in Serie A, not all the contested players of the recent past have left Romagna. Other elements with more market have done it, whose departure also allows us to keep a close eye on the budget. Some targeted arrivals, Plisseri in goal, Donnarumma on his left in defense, Cristian Shpendi who takes on the legacy of his twin in attack and Giovannini’s promotion from the Primavera who, hopefully, will once again reveal all the goodness of the local nursery.
No relaunch, no faranoic signing campaign, Cesena doesn’t fold but neither does it double and if compared to last season they blatantly don’t have the underdogs, maybe everything changes just when nothing changes. Perhaps this is the reasoning of the fans in the stands, I can’t say, but in some ways it amazes me not to find them on a war footing after the banners at the end of last season. The environment at the “Dino Manuzzi” is typically holiday-like, while all of Romagna flocks to the coast for fun or work, “only” 3,418 spectators are present at the stadium, divided between the Curva and Tribuna. We’re not even a third of last season’s average viewers but it’s not even a figure to throw away, contextualizing everything. The Distinti are completely closed, in the away sector instead a handful of Virtus Entella fans will arrive a few minutes late, young but without patches or other distinctive elements and without support.
There are also many absences in Curva Mare where the WSB propose the away banner and there are also some defections at group level. For example, the banner of the Viking but the hold in terms of compactness, especially in the upper part, is excellent and so is the vocal support. The imprint of their first chants suggests that Cesena is the main asset of the fans and that therefore the only goal will always be to support the team and push it to do its best, regardless of the now exhausted trust credit on the part of who guides him from the control room.
There have been matches with large crowds and much higher stakes, where the support was both positive and far more powerful than today, yet the Mare tonight is one of my favorites by far in so many ways. Because in terms of proportion, the people who sing are much more than those who came just to watch the match, because even in the absence of a counterpart, continuity is high, because just when you expect little or nothing, you find yourself a reality whose minimum wage it is already sensationally high compared to the category average.
There is in practice only a slight decrease at the start of the second half, when it takes almost ten minutes for the cheers to recharge and even extra time and penalties are followed more with shortness of breath and a humorous participation that prevails over the more coordinated choruses. Overall, however, it is precisely in these moments, in these races that Cesena’s full potential is seen, that potential that when the public increases by another ten thousand spectators you would expect ten thousand times stronger. However, the reality is that not all the public manages to impact the race with the same passion as the much reviled ultras. Those who respectable often define as “people who have nothing to do with football” and that in these moments you realize how precious they are. How much, without them, everything would be an empty and sad theater. Which perhaps many would also like, but which the matches behind closed doors during the pandemic period have shown to be the real beating heart of this game.
Opened a parenthesis on the field, a step back is due: it really seems that everything has changed when a strong-willed Cesena first takes the lead with Cristian Shpendi in the 17th minute and after having constantly guarded the opponent’s field for the entire first fraction, he closes it with Ciofi who he hits Adamo’s corner with his head on goal. The second half instead shifted the balance to the opposite side and within five minutes, between the 51st and 56th minutes again signed by Meazzi, plunged the bianconeri into the nightmare that nothing has changed. Impacted on 2 to 2, Virtus Entella puts the opponents on the ropes above all psychologically and on two occasions almost knocked out. Between illusion and hope there is a Pisseri difference: the new Cesena goalkeeper in fact providentially puts his hand in both Ligurian attempts and then when it goes to penalties, just when all the appeals and ghosts seemed to recall the cursed night of the playoffs, rejects the decisive penalty from Zappella bringing the contest to the bitter end, remedies Saber’s mistake by opposing Siatounis and finally delivers the passage to the thirty-second, once again surpassing Thioune.
The stadium explodes, the scarves are unfolded, more torches are lit, a vehement cry “Whoever doesn’t jump is a Bolognese…” rises: in fact, with the round going on, Cesena gives itself the derby with Bologna which has been missing for over a decade, dotted with more disappointments than joys. The glories of Serie A and even B are far away. Probably they won’t even be revived in this match, given the difference in strengths and categories, but the most important challenge is to resolve this impasse between the mortifying past and future aspirations. The fans have shown that they deserve it, but the team and the club have to prove that they deserve this fan base.
Matthew Falcone
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2023-08-18 17:31:46
#CesenaVirtus #Entella #Coppa #Italia #begins #ends
