Serie A is over, or rather not: there is still the Spezia-Hellas Verona playoff

The results of the 38th day of Serie A

Napoli-Sampdoria 2-0 64′ Osimhen, 85′ Simeone
Atalanta-Monza 5-2 12′, 45′ +1, 79′ Koopmeiners, 51′ Colpani (M), 74′ Højlund, 81′ Petagna (M), 92′ Muriel
Lecce-Bologna 2-3 17′ Banda (L), 58′ Arnautović, 81′ Zirkzee, 88′ Oudin (L), 97′ Ferguson
Milan-Verona 3-1 45′ +2 pens Giroud, 71′ Faraoni (V), 85′, 92′ Rafael Leão
Roma-Spezia 2-1 6′ Nikolaou (S), 43′ Zalewski, 91′ pen. Dybala
Udinese-Juventus 0-1 68′ Church
Sassuolo-Fiorentina 1-3 46′ Cabral, 71′ pen. D. Berardi (S), 79′ Saponara, 83′ N. González
Turin-Inter 0-1 37′ Brozović
Cremonese-Salernitana 2-0 26′ Buonaiuto, 88′ Tsadjout
Empoli-Lazio 0-2 48′ A. Romagnoli, 92′ Luis Alberto

The Serie A standings after 38 days

Naples 90; Lazio 74; Inter 72; Milan 70; Atalanta 64; Rome 63; Juventus 62 (-10); Fiorentina 56; Bologna 54; Turin 53; Monza 52; Udinese 46; Sassuolo 45; Empoli 43; Salerno 42; Lecce 36; Spezia and Verona 31; Cremona 27; Sampdoria 19.

Because thirty-eight championship days weren’t enough to define the final standings

The championship is over, hallelujah. Indeed not, great calm: Sunday 11 June, in prime time, Spezia and Hellas Verona will have to play the last ninety minutes, plus any penalties, to designate who will join Cremonese and Sampdoria in Serie B 2023-24. If an hour and a half plus recovery time weren’t enough, no extra time or golden goals, but directly penalties: a decision that displaces those with the long bench and forces the two coaches to meticulously try the spot shots during the week . The way they got there, it’s clear that Spezia have everything to lose – after having squandered a significant lead in terms of points and in terms of confidence – while the yellow and blues would have everything to gain. And if in football every match makes its own story, eliminating gaps and conditions (Inter hopes so, opposing Manchester City in the Champions League final the previous evening), the Veronese fans will live these days with the ghost of the two 2007 play-offs , when Spezia sent Hellas to Serie C1 after 64 years of history. The protagonist at the time was the La Spezia goalkeeper Nicola Santoni, while a certain Giampiero Ventura sat on the Venetian bench…

Because Nicola Zalewski’s football nationality is a political fact and not just a sporting one

Roma returns from the European final in Budapest humiliated and beaten, beyond their limits or demerits. The game in gusts, very televised since Giorgio Martino praised them on Rai 2 at the end of the eighties, only partially hides the souk on the sidelines every time José Mourinho doesn’t like a decision: who knows what he may have said, between himself and himself, while under disqualification he watched the penalty not granted against Spezia and the one actually granted at the last minute. In Hungary as at the Olimpico he stood out – and it’s not the first time – Nicholas Zalewski, wide winger with a great shot and a cross to go out: diligent, spirited player, he feels the shirt more than others as a Roman from the provinces. A future flag, perhaps, but above all an element that would look great in Roberto Mancini’s national team: great calm unfortunately, since having been born in Tivoli to Polish parents, despite having dual citizenship, he preferred to represent a country where he has never lived, compared to what he cannot fail to feel as his own since birth and growing up. It is the most striking case of the dominance of the ius sanguinis above it ius alone in Italy: while the French neighbors have built up the strength and pride of their second generation athletes, here the Retegui great-grandchildren of over a hundred years ago go fishing. Here, plastically, a battle to ride for those who feel like doing it: the new Italians would make Italy win much more than the heirs of the natives.

Because in the magnificent Italy under 20, world semifinalist, there is a star that does not shine

Speaking of the national team, slightly bizarre timetables and coincidences are making thefeat by Nino Nunziata’s Under 20s, who reached the semifinals at the World Cup in Argentina after getting rid of Brazil, England and Colombia. Thursday at 11 pm Italian time the match against South Korea, on the other hand Uruguay and the surprise Israel will compete: easy to say that now the “unknowns” will be a little less so. And if it is true that Chelsea have seen longer than Inter regarding Cesare Casadei (even top scorer as a midfielder), almost only one element – the valid Empoli born Tommaso Baldanzi – plays in Serie A in the first team squads, and was currently on the pitch every weekend in coach Paolo Zanetti’s choices. Almost, in fact: in the two knockout matches, Simone Pafundi, the prodigy boy whom Mancini started calling up to the A national team at the age of 16 (“when we say, first him and then all the others”), remained idle, despite the that his coach Andrea Sottil grants him is scarcely ten minutes per game. It is clear that the expert Nunziata thinks like his colleague from Udine, and that the excessive blue enthusiasm has a little dazed the jewel: perhaps he got lost, as happens to many? Great calmbecause the 17-year-old from Monfalcone deserves at least the appeal test in the top flight, which inevitably passes for his physical strength in contrast with the cuirassiers of the opposing defenses.

Because tactically the regular season that just ended wasn’t so revolutionary

What championship was it, from the point of view of tactical innovations? No revolution, given that already in the nineties (Fabio Capello with Marcel Desailly) it happened to advance a central defender in the direction: but in this context the starting 4-4-2 was not altered, as instead happens with Pep Guardiola and his rivals , which widen the lateral stitches without revealing the density in the centre. More than anything else, there were those – Simone Inzaghi, Zanetti himself, almost always the two technicians who took turns at the helm of the Cremonese – who understood that two strikers in the area are more dangerous than a single one, even if surrounded by a crowd of attacking midfielders like in the prevailing 4-2-3-1 or 4-3-3. And if everything is naturally aimed at victory, and therefore at scoring one more goal, it is also true that in the standings the teams that know how to concede less predominate. They could be taken as obvious, but great calm: when an effective antidote to the descents on the back and to the cross towards the attacking midfielder will be discovered (according to some, 75 percent of the dangers for defenders in current football arrive in this way), almost only the “problem” will remain to be solved dead ball nets. Which represent, yes, at least another 20 percent sure of the sources of goals.

Because the next Serie A championship will be like the one ended, but different, but the same

That Great calm would it be, if he didn’t already turn his gaze to the next Serie A? A tournament that promises to be curious, starting with Luciano Spalletti’s sure “escape” from the Scudetto-winning Naples, and the hunt for his successor: a similar situation could be faced by Roma, who knows, Fiorentina. Where the Neapolitans will arrive in the Champions League is as much an unknown as the eventual penalization of Juventus by UEFA, which will condition the transfer market while Milan and Inter will seek immediate revenge, still with a continental final to play. Together with Frosinone and Genoa, one between Bari and Cagliari will rise: if the former will immediately pose the question of ownership to Aurelio de Laurentiis, the latter would confirm Claudio Ranieri in the face of all the young Jokists and Butlerians of the benches. Which foreign champion will choose the Italian championship this year to establish itself, to relaunch itself, to spend the winter? Will there still be the desire to talk about it every week since last summer, between stew schedules and European qualifiers not to be missed? The real issue: the Calciozoic attracts less and less young women, as a microscopic reproduction of the Anthropocene. A little more, and we’re gone.