Cagliari Club Focus: The Season So Far…

Date: 1st January 2015 at 12:06pm
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With half the games gone in Serie A, Cagliari find themselves struggling in the relegation zone. Forza Italian Football brings you a review of all that has happened over the first half of Cagliari’s gruelling season.

Cagliari LogoCagliari sit 18th in Serie A, but their season had begun with much excitement and anticipation over new owner Tommaso Giulini’s appointing Zdenek Zeman as coach.

Although the summer had seen Mauricio Pinilla and Davide Astori leave, the arrival of the Czech coach and his unorthodox but ultra-offensive tactics augured interesting things for the season.

Zemanlandia never really took however. Cagliari were winless in their opening four Serie A matches, but more crucially only managed three goals. It took the fifth game for the goal glut to finally come, in a rampant 4–1 win against Inter.

Such results were rare however, with Zeman’s Cagliari only managing more than two goals in a single game on two other separate occasions: a 4–0 victory against Empoli and a 3–3 draw with Napoli.

Their profligacy left Cagliari mired in the relegation zone for much of 2014. In fact, were it not for the heroics of goalkeeper Alessio Cragno, Cagliari could find themselves further than just three points from safety today. Zeman was ultimately unable to survive until the Christmas break, and thus replaced by Gianfranco Zola.

Transfer Hit & Flop

In a team that has been struggling as much as Cagliari, it is difficult to pick out standout performers. However young midfielder Godfred Donsah seems to have shown some interesting potential since arriving from Palermo. Although the Ghanaian has mostly made substitute appearances, he showed the energy and fearlessness that Zeman has often managed to refine into more polished product.

The Transfer flop has to be the coach. Two wins in 16 games and only 20 goals to show for it; it is fair to say that Zemanlandia failed in Sardinia. No one really expected Zeman to turn Cagliari into Europa League contenders, but he failed to even imprint the team with the offensive flair supporters had come to expect of the Czech coach.

Coach

Zeman struggled a lot with Cagliari. He struggled in terms of adapting his personnel to his tactics. The midfield seemed to be most problematic for Zeman, not technically quick enough in its ability to play the ball forward. The forward line lacked real incision as well. This hampered Cagliari, forcing the team to play very deep on the counter-attack, which only exposed the defence more.

In the end Zeman seemed to have lost the words to motivate his troops and was thus relieved of his duties. Zola will be hoping to get more out of this team now, by using the upcoming January transfer window and lifting the players’ heads in order to ready them for he upcoming 2015 relegation battle.

Best Goal – Danilo Avelar v Empoli

Danilo Avelar scored a sumptuous freekick, in one of Cagliari’s rare Zemanlandia-style victories, to crown a resounding 4–0 away win against Empoli.

[youtube]http://youtu.be/ZSp0iuNL4Pk[/youtube]

 

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