After the heavy 3-0 loss to Roma last weekend it looks almost certain that the Amaranto will be heading back to Serie B after just one season back in Serie A.
They currently sit joint bottom with Catania, four points a drift of the nearest team. Moral is at an all-time-low and the Tuscan side can hardly buy a win right now.
One positive, if you can call it a positive, is that the Amaranto have a coach after appointing Domenico Di Carlo until the summer after firing Davide Nicola. However, is the former Chievo boss the right man for the job?
The ex-Livorno midfielder has hardly excelled at his previous clubs, with his teams being well drilled and defensively good but often struggle to score goals.
This is a big problem as the Amaranto have been misfiring all season and a more offensive minded coach is needed. So who should they have went for instead of Di Carlo I hear you ask.
Well, Zdenek Zeman would have made perfect sense, not just due to the fact he is the king of attacking football but for many other reasons.
First of all, Livorno have many young players in this current squad and Zeman has a proven record with young players with the likes of Marco Verratti and Lorenzo Insigne during his time at Pescara, just to name a few.
The likes of Alfred Duncan, Ibrahima Mbaye, Marco Benassi would surely all have benefited if for arguments sake the Czech coach had taken over.
Although all three of the above players are owned by Inter, surely even the short-term benefit of seeing them grow is better than seeing them have little playing time under another coach?
On top of this, the famous 4-3-3 that Zeman likes to use would of been perfect for this current team. An attacking trio of Innocent Emeghara and Luca Siligardi with Paulinho in the middle would have been a threat to any defense in the league. Then the likes of Mbaye bombing on from the full back position to give further support.
And is if that wasn’t enough, even if the Amaranto had gone down with Zeman in charge he would stand a good chance of bringing them back up to Serie A the following year.
The final reason why the former Roma coach was the right man for the job is, Livorno is the home of anarchy and the resistance movement in Italy and who is more of a rebel and against the system than Zeman? Well, maybe that’s a rather feeble reason but it’s a reason nonetheless.
Unfortunately though this is all hypothetical and we won’t be seeing Zemanlandia making a return to Serie A, well not with Livorno at least.
Now all we can do is hope that Di Carlo can perform a minor miracle and keep the Amaranto in Serie A. This weeks game against Sassuolo could either be the spark to ignite the comeback or it could be the final nail in the coffin for the Tuscan side in their return to Serie A.
Zeman would have been great. Unfortunately I think Di Carlo will take Livorno down to Serie B. He’s too pragmatic.
Zeman should well be hired by Sassuolo after being beaten today by Livorno. They have young attackers like Berardi and Zaza, and we know what wonders Zeman has worked with other youngsters. For all the reasons you mentioned about Livorno hiring Zeman, the same can be said for Sassuolo.