The mood at the Stadio Olimpico was far from happy this past Saturday. The home side was losing against Torino, a team that had allowed ten goals while scoring only two in their last five league matches. Fans from the Curva Nord were concluding their ongoing dissent in a continuous dispute with club owner Claudio Lotito.
This Year's Efforts Coming Unstitched?
Was the team's progress coming unstitched, or was there ever a binding element holding it together from the beginning? The club brought back Maurizio Sarri as head coach this summer, before he to later acknowledge that the management had omitted to inform him about the transfer ban they were about to receive for fiscal problems. Speculation that he could resign were not true, but he did say that Lotito had "misled" him.
The Roman club became as messy during matches as behind the scenes, defeating Verona 4-0 and Genoa 3-0 but losing the rest of their opening fixtures, which included the capital clash. At any given moment, observers have struggled to tell if they're getting better or collapsing.
Cancellieri's Unexpected Return
One individual kept smiling throughout. Matteo Cancellieri wasn't originally meant to be at Lazio during this campaign. He completed the previous campaign with Parma on loan and, early this summer, his parent club were pushing for him to remain there temporarily. The registration embargo necessitated a reconsideration. Lazio could not afford to weaken their team without replacements.
He signed originally under Sarri's first spell, at that time a 20-year-old alumnus of Verona's academy. He made 20 league appearances in Lazio colors in the 2022-23 season, almost all of those as a substitute. Their former sporting director, Igli Tare, who left following that term, would later accuse Sarri of "telling everyone Cancellieri had superstar potential only to bench him consistently."
Finding His Natural Fit
Maybe Sarri was persistently working to work out the specific characteristics of Cancellieri's abilities. Billed as a flank player when he joined, Cancellieri yet was deployed for most of that campaign as an ineffective backup to Ciro Immobile at No 9. In 63 appearances while playing for Empoli and Parma over the last two seasons, he netted seven goals. Shoehorn
