udine
«It is always a pleasure and an honor to come back to Udine, to find the people with whom I have been well, and it will also be special to challenge a teacher, as Pierpaolo Marino was for me». It is Daniele Pradè who sends the classic “kiss” from Florence, where the Fiorentina sporting director is finally experiencing the first encouraging start of the season in purple, in line with the expectations and investments of the ambitious patron Rocco Commisso, the Italian tycoon -American who in June 2019 thought of him to replace Pantaleo Corvino.
The greeting sent yesterday through our magazine to the environment of Udine demonstrates the attachment and esteem that the Roman executive maintained for the square and the Juventus club, where he lived a single year (’18 -’19), characterized first from the Velazquez experimentation – which lasted just 13 games and until mid-November – and then from the salvation tribulations passed through the Nicola and Tudor managements. In short, it was not really a great season, but Pradè at Udinese set up the operations linked to the arrivals of Rolando Mandragora and Stefano Okaka. On the latter, in particular, the ds was decisive in convincing the former center forward known at the time of Roma, who did not want to leave Watford.
Tomorrow he will therefore return to Friuli, in the same stadium where Udinese and Fiorentina lived the first match of the Covid era played behind closed doors, on 8 March 2020, and something says that this time he will present himself to win, as his words imply. with the challenge launched to Marino. On the other hand, Viola is in great shape, on the long wave of an encouraging start with three consecutive victories in which there was no lack of tests of strength, read the blitzes of Bergamo with Atalanta and Marassi with Genoa. The knockout with Inter came only after dominating the first fraction and the inferiority due to the red to Nico Gonzalez, the most expensive purchase (23.5 million) of the market which saw outlays for 33 million and disposals for 24.5, with the great blow represented by the confirmation of Vlahovic. The arrival of an innovative technician like Italian has then redone the look of the game. Quite the opposite of what had instead happened in the last two breathless seasons, with a 10th place conquered on the banks of the Arno (’19 -’20), where management difficulties were not lacking, between the arrival of Ribery’s trumpet blasts. and the first courtships of Juve to Chiesa, which later remained, and 13th place last season. –
S.M.
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