A season of consolidation followed for Sassuolo after their debut in Serie A last season and the Neroverdi built on the solid striking foundation that saw them delight the masses with one of Italian football’s most entertaining teams.
When they stop thumbing their noses at Claudio Lotito to wave greetings to similarly-sized Serie A newboys Carpi and Frosinone, Sassuolo will be able to reflect on the fact they have come to offer a blueprint to promoted clubs. After last season’s campaign erred between the gutters and the stars, this time around has seen Eusebio Di Francesco’s side enjoy far more stability.
The hoodoo the club – and for Domenico Berardi in particular – seems to have over AC Milan has yielded six points but there have been other games that have demonstrated the progress the Neroverde are making overall. A 1-1 home draw with Juventus sparked a run of eight games without defeat and provided notice that Di Francesco’s side could make hay against any side.
Overall, their good form has largely been built on a good home record – nobody outside the top six has won at the Mapei Stadium, and while their away results haven’t been wonderful, Sassuolo were safely ensconced in midtable.
That said, it has been a season of patches – that eight game run followed one of six without a win, and there was another spell of four defeats in a row to come before another run, this time of four victories, rounded the year out.
However, for a club who are living within financially modest means, season on season improvement is key and there are more points and a higher league position this time around. That stability has been matched in the dugout, where Eusebio Di Francesco has been neither fired nor rehired.
Instead, the former Roma man has ended the season batting away questions about his future, though a contract through to 2017 appears to have put paid to any undue speculation for the time being.
Player of the Season
While Francesco Acerbi’s story is positive in every way, and Simone Zaza has further enhanced his burgeoning reputation, it is impossible to look past Domenico Berardi. The wunderkind has added another 15 goals to his name this season and his side failed to win any of the games he missed.
For a team who are not packed with stars, Berardi shines brightly above all of them and should he move on as appears likely this summer, it will create a hole in the side that may be impossible to fill.
Goal of the Season
With Zaza and Berardi firing on all cylinders again, there have been some delightful strikes, and Antonio Floro Flores has put his name up in lights on occasion. Indeed, those three combined to scintillating effect for Berardi’s third goal in his most recent hat-trick against Milan.
However, Simone Zaza seems to have an unerring ability to score brilliant goals out of nowhere. Against Genoa in the season-closer, he unleashed a venomous scissor-kick that might have claimed this crown had it not flicked off a defender into the net.
As it was, his volley against Cagliari in the curtain raiser remains a thing of beauty, aesthetically unequalled by anything that has come since. More famed for his power and his work ethic, this showed that Zaza has considerable technical ability in his locker, too.
[youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CCrNGTsgz9w[/youtube]
Best and Worst Signings
Confirming Berardi’s presence for another season was perhaps the most important signing Sassuolo made last summer, but bringing Andrea Consigli into the club has been a good move, too.
He can’t lay claim to all fifteen of the goals Sassuolo were better off defensively this season from last, but a solid goalkeeper is the basis of a solid side, and aside from an early shellacking by Inter, that is something the Neroverde have been this season.
There have not been many bad signings; which is perhaps one reason the Neroverde have been able to flourish. That said, Dejan Lazarevic may well look back at his loan move from Chievo without any great fondness.
The Slovenian was very much a bit part player, never quite convincing enough to win a first team shirt outright.
The Coach
Eusebio Di Francesco has used his second chance to great effect. A cerebral coach, he has generally shied away from shifting blame away from his own side when things have gone wrong – and there were certainly poor periods throughout the campaign.
The exception came during a horrible run of injuries early in 2015 and had the effect of making his gripes look genuine, rather than sour grapes.
One of few disciples of Zdenek Zeman to look as though they are able to mould the Czech’s ethos into a workable system, Di Francesco has ensured his Sassuolo side play attacking, open football. When that has worked, it has brought some unexpected and thrilling results.
When it hasn’t – notably against Inter – it has seen the Neroverde take a few pastings. All in all, he has performed well and, in leading the club to safety with weeks to spare, has seen his stock reach an all-time high. Equally, it would have been easy to slack off when safety was secured, but Sassuolo used that opportunity to go on their best run of the season; credit to Di Francesco’s motivational skills.
One can raise a criticism in the fact that Berardi has retained his impudent nature – he has had more cards in his two Serie A seasons than birthdays throughout his life – and while he remains young, his importance to the team means that they would have benefited from him missing fewer games.
Di Francesco has not been able to coach that out of him, and his propensity to receive cards of either colour would not be well received higher up the leagues.
