Football Season Guide

The recent past has been far from impressive for Udinese, who found themselves forgetting their glorious campaigns with Francesco Guidolin at the helm and collecting disappointment after disappointment. The past season in particular saw the Zebras seriously flirting with relegation as they recorded 11 defeats in a row, their worst Serie A streak ever. After such a disaster, the management would have been expected to take some solutions in order to start a new life and take a different route from the one adopted in the past seasons. Udinese opted for something different. In fact, they decided to make their life even more complicated by hiring the unknown Julio Velazquez as the new coach. The Spaniard has never managed a top flight team in his country and he has absolutely no experience of the Serie A. His hiring was seen by the fans as more dangerous than jumping off a flying plane without a parachute. Besides that, Udinese got rid of a few players who had been not particularly convincing in the past campaign: Maxi Lopez, Stipe Perica, Sylvain Widmer were all let go. Together with them, also Emil Halfredsson and Jakub Jankto left: the former due to his age and the latter after coming at odds with club and supporters. A major loss was certainly represented by Alex Meret’s sale to Napoli: he was the sort of player Udinese should have built their team around. The money arrived from Napoli was immediately invested in Rolando Mandragora, their most expensive signing ever, who was given the keys of the midfield in the 4-2-3-1 formation adopted by Mr Nodoby Velazquez. Sekou Fofana or Valon Behrami could be acting alongside him in a holding role. The young Argentinean Juan Musso should be acting in the goal while Nicolas, from Hellas Verona, should be his back-up as once-a-promise Simone Scuffet could be leaving too. The returning from injury Hidde Ter Avest and the unknown Nicholas Opoku are expected to strengthen a defence which could end up losing Danilo, at odds with the club. In the attack, Felipe Vizeu, from Flamengo, Ignacio Pussetto, from Huracan, and Darwin Machis, on loan from Granada, should become protagonists too. Udinese have been weakened in almost all departments but the midfield: a defender and a forward capable of scoring to act alongside Kevin Lasagna are highly needed if they want to avoid further and worse disasters.