The season so far

By: Marco | January 4th, 2009

Atalanta have had a good season so far grabbing wins against some of the top 7 teams while cleaning up the bottom feeders. We opened up against Siena winning 1-0 but then hit mixed results against Catania, Chievo, Torino and Reggina. Losses were expected against Roma, Milan and Juventus even if Roma are in very poor form at the moment. If we could have grabbed some points from the likes of Catania and Torino and definitely Reggina and Chievo we would be much higher up. But it is a long season ahead and considering our key midfield component, Cigarini, has been injured for sometime we have managed to scrape through. Hopefully he should return in a month or two and our injury list isn’t that bad.

January will be a so-so month for La Dea as we open up against the pretty men in pink and then on to face that other team from Milan. We finish off Jan. against Siena and Bologna who through previous encounters we should beat. Palermo have the potential to do great things but haven’t done so this year. They will still be a test though and we should hope to get as many points as possible. Inter are Inter (you don’t want to hear my true opinion on them) so I don’t expect us to pull off any miracles.

The rest of the schedule has its far share of tough match ups against Juventus, Roma (if they can actually start playing) and Milan. Also add in Fiorentina, Lazio and Genoa into the mix and it will st ill be a competitive finish. Due to our lack of firepower, depth and money we will most likely finish off the year in the top / mid table position. But we are good enough to evade the lower half hopefully.

On to the good part. Players of the season so far.

Sergio Floccari – ST – Everyone’s new favorite player who has seemingly appeared from the darkness and scored his way into the light. 8 goals and 2 assists in 17 appearances isn’t as good as Pato or some of the other forwards but as of late he has been in great form and if he keeps it up we can grind out some good results.

Cristiano Doni – AM – Doni hasn’t scored as much as some of the other players but he has done his fair share of the hard work and has had a good season. Nothing special but a good season none the less. Considering not everyone is blessed with the longevity of Paolo Maldini, aka the greatest defender of all time, at 35 Doni is still going strong and he has looked good so far shape wise.

Tiberio Guarente – CM – He has filled the void for Luca Cigarini’s position in the midfield by adding in a physical presence. Not as creative as Cigarini or good for that matter he makes up for it with Ambrosini like play. 27 fouls in 16 games and a total of 5 yellow cards for him. When Cigarini comes back hopefully we can fit both of them in the midfield together.

The Mercato side of La Dea has been quiet. I would love it if we went after Juan Manuel Torres but that won’t happen. Maybe we could poach off Adriano from Inter and turn him into a good player, like I did in FM with my pure managerial skills, or maybe get Pazzini. But as Italy goes it probably won’t happen and I am sure that Del Neri thinks that we don’t need any more players. But when the injury crisis hits who will be laughing? I will while getting completely plastered because of our relegation.