FLORENCE – Last season they won five games in the Conference League and reached the final. After all, on May 29, 2024, they only lost in the final against Olympiakos Piraeus. So who would have expected a significant slide into the floors of unwanted and annoyed.
Today? Today they are stumbling helplessly at the bottom of Serie A and their outlook is downright tragic – six points, 15 games, a score of 12:26, eight points to last place meaning salvation and not a single win. Yes, ACF Fiorentina footballers found themselves in an unenviable situation. However, they must eat what they have cooked, and as soon as possible, because it may be too late.
The club from the beautiful city in Tuscany is experiencing a sad autumn for the third time in its history. Only twice in their 99-year history had they gone 15 games without a win – 1937/38 and 1970/71.
“Viola sinks, clouds over Vanoli. Protests at Artemio Franchi, rescue is eight points away,” wrote the Italian newspaper Corriere dello Sport.
Change of coach and another one is imminent
Fiorentina already managed to change their coach during the ongoing season, Stefano Pioli had to leave his chair and Paolo Vanoli took his place. Even the 53-year-old native of Varese didn’t turn the purple boat heading in the opposite direction in any significant way. The misery and hopelessness of the “violets” was amplified by Sunday’s 1:2 loss against the eighteenth-ranked Verona on their home turf.
Immediately after the match came a strong and really tough move from the upper floors, indicating that the ACF plans to close in on their bubble. The club announced that the players and management team would not speak to the media and the entire squad was ordered to leave immediately for an indefinite training camp at the Viola Park training complex ahead of Thursday’s Conference League finish at Lausanne.
As it is customary in the Italian football environment (and not only in it, we salute Scuderia Ferrari from the F1 family), it is done with emotions, which means that coach Vanoli could soon take away the bad results. According to the portal Corriere dello Sport, the most serious candidate to take over the coaching scepter is Davide Ballardini, who personally attended the match against Hellas Verona on Sunday.
Fiorentina, which we could easily call a “walking corpse”, does not have a positive influence even considering the statistics from the past. They say that among the best European leagues, in the 21st century, only two clubs that started even more disastrously than “Viola” – Herthe Berlin in the 2009/10 season and 1. FC Kolin in the 2017/18 season – managed to avert the collapse. At that time, the first club had only five points after 14 games, Kolinčani three.
Either way, their rescue was tantamount to a minor miracle, and Fiorentina’s will be no different, even if fans, despite football Europe, would like to save the traditional club and two-time Serie A champions.
The website Transfermarkt.com reported that since 2000, 13 teams in Italy have started the season with an average of less than a point per game after the 14th round, but only four times have they managed to save themselves – three times by Parma (2002, 2005 and 2007) and once by AC Milan, who started the season with an eight-point deficit and finally sensationally fought for participation in the League with 61 points masters.
In Fiorentina’s squad, we can find several well-known and talented names – David de Gea between the three posts, Dodo or Marin Pongračić in defense, midfielders Nicolo Fagioli, Robin Gosens or Rolando Mandragora, and Moise Kean, Christian Kouame, Roberto Piccoli, Albert Gudmundsson and veteran Edin Džeko in attack.
Hopefully, the beginning of the 21st century and bankruptcy will not repeat
ACF Fiorentina went through a serious financial crisis at the beginning of the 21st century and declared bankruptcy in 2002. After the 2001/02 season, it became clear that Fiorentina had huge debts (around 42 million euros) and was unable to pay its obligations. The club was placed into receivership in June 2002 and subsequently officially declared bankrupt. As a result, the FIGC (Italian Football Federation) denied him a place in Serie B and the club’s original society essentially ceased to exist.
Subsequently, a new club Florentia Viola (later again ACF Fiorentina) was founded in August 2002, which had to start in Serie C2 (the fourth division) and gradually fought its way back to Serie A. This was partly the result of excessive spending on player arrivals and high wages, which the club was unable to cover with its own income.
At the time, the club was owned by Vittorio Cecchi Gori, a film producer and businessman. His financial situation deteriorated and although he managed to raise additional funds in the short term, he was unable to secure sufficient funding to keep the club afloat. For a long time, he spent more than he earned, which became fatal for him. The peak of his exaggerated ambitions were the forced sales of players such as Gabriel Batistuta to AS Rome or Manuel Rui Costa to AC Milan.
However, the debts continued to grow even after that, the club was unable to repay the loans to the banks and the players did not receive salaries. According to reports from the time, player salaries were at the level of AC Milan or Juventus, but Fiorentina suffered from poor marketing and a smaller stadium, and owner Gori was accused of running the club with emotion rather than reason.
Now it remains to be hoped not only by the memorialists, but also by the younger generation, that none of this will happen again, and for Christmas they can only wish for one thing – that kind angels fly down and arrange a 180-degree turn of the situation and the intervention of some kind of magic from somewhere. Sports circles often like to use the formula that such and such a club does not deserve to be relegated, or does not deserve to be at the bottom of the table of the top competition. Well, what he sows, he gets. Just as Fiorentina got into trouble on their own, they also have to dig themselves out of it.
- Author: © List/ Ondrej Herceg
- Source: Sports shoes
