In the afternoon of yesterday, the first leg of the pro/rel play-off was played in Narni (next to Terni: the Serie B's team had the home advantage in this first leg, the Serie A's one will have it in the deciding match). Napoli, who had rested most of their players in the last match of the league on Sunday and subsequently looked quite sharp, was always dangerous from set pieces and indeed they scored in the 1st Half with an header by Tecla Pettenuzzo from CK-action. In the 2nd Half, at the hour mark, the game had to be stopped for a rainstorm that rapidly turned into a hailstorm: about 20 minutes later, the teams came back on the pitch and, at 72', Ternana unexpectedly equalized with a long-range shot from Camilla Labate that was tragically misjudged by GK Doris Bačić. Although quite random, this goal had seemed to have changed the course of this play-off series, until, basically at the last possible chance, at 90'+2', Napoli managed to score again with captain Paola Di Marino (again, from a set-piece situtation, that included a double cross by Miharu Kobayashi: Ternana's players looked clearly unpreperad to defend this kind of plays). Ternana protested a supposed off-side position for a long time: the video-replay can't settle the question, since the available footage don't show an ideal angle to judge, but my impression is that Paola Di Marino was kept on-side by at least one Ternana's DF at the center of the box. Anyway, now it will be very difficult for the Umbrian team to win the away match in Napoli. We're going to see next Sunday. 1st leg of the promotion/relegation play-off: Ternana 1-2 Napoli Highlights of the match:
Firstly, I apologize for my mistake: the final-match was actually played in Cesena. I was mislead by a bad source, but I should have double-checked. With that out of the way, let's talk about the match itself, that was incredible: Roma showcased all their worst and all their best in it. Their defense was abysmal since the beginning of the game, when GK Camelia Ceasar and DF Lucia Di Guglielmo wrapped up a monumental blunder allowing Pauline Hammarlund to score. Roma managed to equalize quite early with Valentina Giacinti assisted by a reversed-back-heel-lob assist by Manuela Giugliano (if you don't believe at my definition, just look by yourselves; or call it a sombrero assist, if you prefer ) and the match, for some time, seemed to remind of Roma's recent win in the last match of the league (incidentally, for anyone who well knows Valentina Giacinti, look at the sequence of the goal: she crashed against Fiorentina GK Rachele Baldi after hitting the ball with an header and she rolled on the ground flailing; by the time she realizes that she has scored she suddenly jumps up to celebrate as if nothing happened, to only later remember that she had been hit on the nose. ). But in the 2nd Half some more lapses by Roma's defense allowed Madelen Janogy to score a brace that could have virtually sealed the game by minute 72' (Fiorentina's front-line, by the way, seemed a perfectly oiled-machine, with the two Swedish FWs Pauline Hammarlund and Madelen Janogy wonderfully directed by Vero Boquete and Michela Catena). Roma, though, scored a few minutes later with a Manuela Giugliano's long-range FK deflected in goal by Moeka Minami (who made-up for how Madelen Janogy had shrugged her off earlier) and equalized at 89' with their top-scorer Evelyne Viens, once again assisted by Manuela Giugliano (Roma's 3 goals of the night were all assisted by her ). Extra-time saw no goals scored, despite some good chances and some miraculous saves, so the game went to the penalty shootout; there were goals and misses, but everything was level at the 5th round of kicks: that's when 20 yo Emma Severini's shot was easily saved, while Sanne Troelsgaard scored hers to give her team the domestic double of League and National Cup. Roma sure have their shortcomings: if they want to keep dominating in Italy and to have a say in Europe they'll have to somehow address these problems. Fiorentina keep being a mystery: they can do everything and its opposite: as we were mentioning in one of the latest posts here on this thread, they'll sure have to look up at the market. The final of Coppa Italia: Roma 3-3 (4-3 after pso) Fiorentina Highlights:
Heard some rumours Sassuolo may not play in Serie A next season. Sad when the club has done such a great season and been, as we spoken about before, such a good force for italian wofo. The signs are there : Men's team relegated, Piovani leaving for Inter and taking Pleidrup with him and Filangeri going to Fiorentina today..
This is the obvious by-product of making women's football strictly depending on men's club. It's not less sad because you know why it's happening and could see it in advance. Meanwhile, Juventus signed their new coach: it's Massimilano Canzi (don't ask: he basically has no experience in women's football, only in men's football in minor/youth divisions or as second coach, but I don't follow men's football, so I can't assess how good he could be).
Yea, it's both a blessing and a curse, feels USA are on a bit more stable foundation than Europe on this issue, on the other hand this has made wofo grow fast here. I hope Parma take the spot if Sassuolo doesn't participate next season, as they seems serious, but guess it would be Ternana, not a chanse Pomigliano is still in it next season, or could they Frightening thought of losing Sassuolo for Pomigliano. On Canzi I'm not sure it's a bad move, it depends on his character entirily. Think the level of women's coaches on the women's side in general is pretty low and big names doesn't always produce results, like Ganz, Morace and Panico, while Soncin, a no-name, has been solid.
The one-to-last official match of this Italian season had been a thrilling goal-fest between Roma and Fiorentina, that ended up handing the Coppa Italia to Roma only after an equally thriling penalty shootout. The very last one game of the season was a snooze-fest instead. Most of the shots were so weak and centered-placed, with GKs Doris Bačić and Katia Ghioc comfortably collecting all of them with no effort, that you can't help sympathizing with the poor guy who had to scratch out an highlights-video from them. To be honest, there was just one actually dangerous shot, by Marija Banusic at the end of the 1st Half, but after that shot & save there was nothing else worth mentioning. Of course, Napoli were perfectly ok with this unexciting 0-0, since it gives them another season in Serie A Femminile. The goal scored at 90'+2' of the 1st leg on Wednesday turned out to be enough to tip the scales. So, now we have just a market-season ahead of us, along with some friendly matches, teams rumoured to disappear (let's hope it won't happen and, as Sampdoria did last summer, they manage to survive in the end ) and most probably Fiorentina opening the 2024-2025 season with the first round of UEFA Women's Champions' League in late July or early August. Meanwhile, Italy NT is going to face Norway in the Euro-qualifiers. The last match of the 2023-2024 season: Napoli 0-0 Ternana Highlights:
July/August is only the preliminary round. Premiminary round CH Ljuboten (1st) Pyunik (1st) Neftchi Baku (1st) Association 52 For the other teams qualification starts in September (otherwise it would be bad because of Olympic Games). Okay, for Italian teams it would be no problem.
Oh, ok, I was set up to the dates of the previous years, I had totally forgotten that little Olympic tournament in that same time-window!
On a different note, coach Andrea Soncin has called the players for the training camp leading to the double-header vs Norway that will take place on Friday the 31st of May and on Tuesday, the 4th of June. It's a whopping 33 players! Was he afraid not to have enough players to send on the pitch? This is the list: Goalkeepers: Rachele Baldi (Fiorentina), Laura Giuliani (Milan), Katja Schroffenegger (Fiorentina), Margot Shore (Hellas Verona); Defenders: Elisa Bartoli (Roma), Valentina Bergamaschi (Milan), Lisa Boattin (Juventus), Lucia Di Guglielmo (Roma), Maria Luisa Filangeri (Sassuolo), Martina Lenzini (Juventus), Elena Linari (Roma), Elisabetta Oliviero (Sampdoria), Julie Piga (Milan), Cecilia Salvai (Juventus); Midfielders: Arianna Caruso (Juventus), Giulia Dragoni (Barcellona), Aurora Galli (Everton), Manuela Giugliano (Roma), Giada Greggi (Roma), Matilde Pavan (Inter), Cecilia Prugna (Sassuolo), Emma Severini (Fiorentina); Forwards: Chiara Beccari (Sassuolo), Barbara Bonansea (Juventus), Agnese Bonfantini (Inter), Michela Cambiaghi (Inter), Sofia Cantore (Juventus), Michela Catena (Fiorentina), Valentina Giacinti (Roma), Benedetta Glionna (Roma), Cristiana Girelli (Juventus), Martina Piemonte (Everton), Annamaria Serturini (Inter). I won't extensively comment these calls, that aren't much surprising except for some players coming back from previous injuries. One of these comebacks, though, is too much special not to mention it: 19 yo Matilde Pavan is back after missing a whole season for her ACL injury; calling her back right away after her return on the pitch mostly represent a message to her: "We didn't forget about you and you'll be needed soon".
Is Cambiaghi and Serturini not out with injury? Haven't seen them for some weeks at Inter. I'm a bit curious also about why the Milan full back Angelica Soffia never gets space in these squads, think she's an interesting player, with good speed and attacking sense.Thats a minor issue though, on the whole a very good squad!
Annamaria Serturini is indeed back from injury, it was mentioned in the FIGC article about the calls. Not sure about Michela Cambiaghi, but if she's been called she's most probably fit enough to play. Angelica Soffia debuted in the Senior NT in 2021, when she was just 20, and she even scored a brace that same year, in a friendly match vs Austria. She was playing for Roma, back then. When she transferred to Milan at the end of the 2021-2022 season, she somehow fell from grace and stopped being called to the National Team. I suppose this could have to do both with Milan's disappointing results in these last two seasons and with how under-utilized she often was at her new club, under both managers, Maurizio Ganz and Davide Corti. She was a very promising player and she's just 23 (going to turn 24 in a pair of months), so she still could come back strong: Milan looks like a quite stagnant club, though, at the moment; if they don't revive their team with some serious market-campaign, maybe Angelica Soffia should look elsewhere if she want to somehow re-start her career.
Aha allright, good! Cambiaghi escpecially is critical for this italian team with her work rate and attitude. Yea, and actually as you mentioned she has been sidelined in favour of Guagni and Bergamaschi ,even tthough Milan has been quite bad. Kinda tough duo to compete against for a young and up and coming player, so I think she's been a bit unlucky, I can imagine everytime she makes an error the coach will prefer the more experenced duo.
According to information obtained by us, AS Roma is interested in signing Jovana Damnjanović. 👀 The Italian champion is offering a highly remunerated contract for the Serbian international.Should she make the move to Serie A? 👇#jovanadamnjanovic #asroma #seriea pic.twitter.com/Vf1FyamAqb— Soccerdonna (@soccerdonna) May 30, 2024
I am going to watch the match on Italian TV, so I could interact a little less here; I anyway give the starting line-ups of this first game vs Norway: Italy (4-3-1-2): Giuliani; Di Guglielmo, Linari, Lenzini, Bartoli; Greggi, Caruso, Galli; Bonansea; Cantore, Giacinti Norway (4-3-3): Fiskerstand; Bjelde, Nergsvand, Harviken, Hansen; Boe Risa, Engen, Reiten; Graham, Haug, Ildhusoy. Quite odd that Manuela Giugliano isn't starting. I hope she's anyway physically OK.
Michela Cambiaghi is not even on the bench today: maybe she'll be available for the second match vs Norway.
Italy is on the front foot in these first 15', despite playing in Olso in front of an about 10.000 attendance. Is @Lohmann Giuliani's avatar once again working?
Good save by Laura Giuliani at 45' on Graham Hansen who had dribbled her way into Italian box, than Ildhusøy shots high on the rebound: good final chance for Norway!
0-0 at HT. Both teams had their moments, but there weren't many actual chances to score, although the feeling is that a goal could happen at any time. Italy, quite unexpectedly, look physically sharper than Norway, who are quite slow especially in the movements without the ball. I was pleasantly surprised by Aurora Galli, among our players: she was very good in her defensive runs, often coming back from behind the Norwegian players to strip them the ball.
At 63' a double-change for each team: Ada Hegerberg and Naaslund replace Sophie Roman Haug and Bøe Risa (about 10 minutes earlier Thorisdottir had replaced injured Bjelde). Italy have Giulia Dragoni and Agnese Bonfantini replacing Giada Greggi and Barbara Bonansea.
At 71', Michela Catena replaces Sofia Cantore. At 73' Giulia Dragoni almost scores, but the ball goes wide by a little.