Fiorentina 1, Lazio 2: Match Recap
By: Ted | January 30th, 2008Today in front of tens of fans at the Artemio Franchi in Florence, Fiorentina lost the second leg of their tie with Lazio and thus were eliminated from the Italian Cup. The American announcers calling the game on the station I was watching openly questioned how much Fiorentina wanted the match; certainly by resting Mutu, Coach Cesare Prandelli made it clear that success in the league, and not the cup, was his top priority. Still, the team played an attacking game and made attacking substitutions. Lazio was simply the better team today.
First Half
Prandelli started the game with a strong back four and Montolivo in the midfield, but he was clearly resting his best strikers by putting Bobo and Osvaldo up front. The first ten minutes or so were slow going, but things heated up after a dangerous free kick by Montolivo in the 12th minute. A few moments later the same player broke away and was one-on-one with the keeper, but his shot was saved. Finally in the 17th Bobo Vieri chipped a nice ball into the box that Franco Semioli controlled well and slotted through to make the game 1-0. At this point, the aggregate score was 2-2, with the Viola holding the tie-breaking away goal.
Then it all kind of fell apart. After both clubs nearly exchanged own-goals (the defenses of both clubs were shaky all day) Lazio’s Aleksandar Kolarov placed a beautiful free kick in the back of the net following a very dubious foul outside the box. Frey made a great save before the half, but now that Lazio had the away goal, they were going to be tough to beat.
Second Half
There was much less action in the second half as Lazio pulled away. Prandelli put Pazzini in the game in the 51st to get some more offensive action (he ended up doing very little) but it was Tommaso Rocchi who got on the scoreboard for the visitors after being set up nicely by teammate Goran Pandev. Lazio were now up 4-2 on aggregate, and Fiorentina would have to have scored 3 in the last half hour to win with the away-goal tiebreaker. They made a game of it (Donadel smacked one off the post in the 77th) but it was not to be. Tomas Ujfalusi picked up an injury towards the end of the game (still not sure how serious), Frey continued to work hard until the final whistle, but the game ended 2-1, with Lazio advancing to play Inter and Fiorentina eliminated.
Analysis
Ultimately, we’re just not sure how big a blow all this is for Prandelli and Fiorentina. Clearly they wanted to win this game, but they would not do so at the expense of the league. With the Italian cup out of the way they can focus full attention on Series A and the UEFA cup.
What was more worrisome for me was how toothless the team looked, for long stretches, without Adrian Mutu. I like to think the Viola are a well-rounded offensive team, but if Mutu goes down for an extended period….
Anyway, congratulations to Lazio. This weekend we will focus our attention on AC Milan in anticipation of their big visit to the Artemio Franchi.
Category: Team News
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Comments
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Man, you’re so much nicer to the Viola than I would have been — I see this is a trend. (: I thought they were awful, apart from a few good passes (including Bobo’s for the goal). Gobbi passed to Lazio at least 3x more often than he did his own team, and he was (for me) representative of the whole team, and their collective level of concentration. Even Frey caught it — that second goal was going to take a lot to stop, but I thought he made himself smaller when he closed Rocchi down, rather than getting big and cutting off the goal.
That said, I’m not too unhappy about going out — getting int the CL and advancing in the UEFA Cup definitely are the priorities.
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I understand the priorities but when you’re only two games from the final I don’t see the point in sitting your best player. The fans filled the stadium for a reason.
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I think I actually WAS pretty hard on the Viola. I referred to the team as toothless, called the defense poor, and suggested Pazzini did nothing of consequence.
That being said, I still think a team takes its cues from a coach, and when Pradelli didn’t put out his best side, his club, perhaps even subconsciously, stepped it down a notch. So I am a little hesitant to totally go after the players.
And Vspot, (great name, by the way)I definitely hear what you’re saying. Your choice of words is a little funny, however, as the stadium was definitely not full. Lots and lots of good seats still available. Thus my (lame) little joke that started the post: “Today in front of tens of fans…”
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I didn’t get a chance to see the game, but I’m torn as to the result. I detest Lazio and didn’t want to the see Fiorentina bow out at this point in the competition. But, the Coppa is of dubious importance and I can’t muster much in the way of dissatisfaction regarding the performance.
In addition, I can’t really argue with Prandelli fielding less than his full lineup. Right now, Milan is 7 points back of Fiorentina, with a game in hand, and coming to the Franchi on Sunday evening. I’ll have more thoughts on the game posted later tonight or tomorrow, but this is unquestionably the most important game for Fiorentina up to this point this season. Obviously a tie would suit the Viola very well and a win would put them in a very strong position for the 4th place, but a result like that will be difficult to obtain against an experienced and motivated Milan side (not to mention the fact that Fiorentina have yet to beat one of the Italian “big 4″ this season). At any rate, this has to be considered a dissapointing performance, but the only real concern is whether this diminishes the confidence in the team leading up the match with Milan.
And Martha - What is this trend you speak of? I thought that in recent weeks Fiorentina had been playing much better than their late November - mid December slump.
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