Football Season Guide

After an array of disastrous seasons characterized by coaches and players first hailed as saviours of the country and then thrown away with the litter, and a steady failure in reaching the European spots, in the past campaign Roma management decided to charge the French Garcia with the team and it was an amazing choice. It was immediately clear that he was no Dulcamara as Zeman or Luis Enrique. Quite the contrary. He proved to be a pragmatic coach, capable of getting the most out of his men and he immediately made history with the team winning their first 10 games in a row. Unfortunately for them, though, Juventus belonged to another category and so they ended up triumphing but the Wolves proved to be a serious threat until the final months of the campaign. Quite logically, after such a performance, Garcia was confirmed at the helm and the management tried to strengthen the squad in order to make the quantum leap needed for winning the Scudetto and leading a decent European campaign. Thus, no major players left, despite the offers from the big European clubs for Pjanic, above all. Dodo left for Inter while a few more fringe players, such as Taddei, Bastos, Jedvaj or Toloi, were also let go. At least 3 major players were hired, though. Astori arrived from Cagliari and he could make it straight to the heart of the back four, together with Castan, if Benatia ends up leaving for huge amounts of cash. Cole, from Chelsea, could become the new left-back while Iturbe, from Hellas Verona, was paid an absurd lot of money and he will have to prove his worth in the forward three alongside Totti and Gervinho. Totti actually represents a major question mark. At 38, he is still their best player and he proved it in the past campaign especially when missing. In fact, Roma’s performances regularly got worse and they hardly ever succeeded winning. His clone is desperately needed by Garcia. More players have been signed in order to give the squad some depth, also considering the European campaign, and Uçan is one of those who might prove to be most interesting.