Chapter 451: Winning the Championship in Advance
The rectification campaign about referees is still going on vigorously, and this action is estimated to take a long time, so let's turn our attention back to Zhuang Mingge's Fiorentina.
After a semi-final draw away at Juventus, Fiorentina rushed to Piacenza in northern Italy to prepare for the upcoming 27th round of Serie A.
Despite the huge disparity in quality between Fiorentina and Piacenza, almost everyone living on the Apennine Peninsula is watching the game openly or implicitly. There is no other reason than that the result of this game is likely to determine the winner of this season's Serie A!
As of the 26th round of Serie A, Fiorentina has won 21 wins, 5 draws and 0 losses in 26 league games, accumulating 68 points. Such a record has to be said to be quite unheavenly, after all, the league has been carried out so far, and Juventus, who are in second place, have only scored 48 points, which is a full 20 points gap with Fiorentina. This also means that Fiorentina only need to get four points from eight league games in Zuihou to ensure that the Purple Lilies will lift the Serie A trophy for the third time in a row at the end of the season! (The ranking rule of Serie A is to look at the record of the two teams in the league this season under the same points, so Fiorentina, who won both games with Juventus, has an absolute advantage in this aspect)
"Lads! I know that after most of the season, the energy stored before the start of the season has been almost exhausted, and everyone is really tired. Recently, there has been a lot of media talk about Fiorentina having a chance to break Milan's record of 58 games unbeaten and what else will become the second Serie A team to be unbeaten in a season. I admit that these two records are indeed very tempting......" in the locker room, Capello, who was doing Zuihou's pre-match mobilization, his expression was quite serious, "but I hope you don't look so far away, and don't think about any unbeaten record, just play every next game honestly and play your all." ”
"The boss is right! Now our first goal is to win this game and try to win the league early, if we can't win a team like Piacenza, how can we break the records set by other teams? Barty, the captain of the team, was the first to stand up to the manager, and although the Argentine god of war has not been in great form this season, his status at the club has not declined, and Fiorentina has high respect for the top center forward who is still willing to play in the second division when the team is relegated.
As a result, after captain Barty's statement, Fiorentina's other players also said that they would do their best to win and contribute their liliang to the team's early league championship.
Due to the midweek match against Juventus, the Fiorentina players took a lot of energy, so Capello made a big rotation of the starting line-up for this game, Barty and Inzaghi partnered up front, Costa fed him behind them, Djokaeff and Glen Charles separated from the left and right, forming a link with the two full-backs behind them, leaving only the teenager Zanetti to be responsible for the defense of the midfield.
At the back, Fortunato, Ferrara, Nesta and Angeloma lined up as Fiorentina's steel wall. Veteran Wiljoward is on the bench and Capello intends to put him on the pitch when the big picture is decided, and if he has a good performance during Zuihou, the veteran can get a good job contract from another club after the summer transfer window.
Even goalkeeper Capello made a change, with substitute goalkeeper Gwadarben getting his first league start this season.
Seeing Fiorentina put on such an attacking line-up, the Piacenza manager played with the Italian's ability to play a defensive counter-attack at home, intending to deflate the visiting defending champions.
But Piacenza manager is destined to be disappointed, after the start of the game, Piacenza players, although they hope to take advantage of the home advantage to get a point from Fiorentina, but the overall strength of the overwhelming advantage, and eager to complete the league three consecutive feat Fiorentina players can agree? The Fiorentina players, buoyed by Capello's speech, took just one first half to send the game into garbage time.
Batistuta scored in the 11th minute to break his long league goal drought; Inzaghi also scored in the 22nd and 37th minutes to give Fiorentina a 3-0 lead at half-time.
What excites the Fiorentina players even more is that at half-time they got the latest news from the Alp Stadium from the manager: Juventus, who are playing at home, was actually scored by their opponents in the first half against Zaccheroni's Udinese, and now the old lady is down 0-1 at home to Udinese!
Ahead of the start of this league round, Parma, who are third in the standings, have a point difference of twenty-two points against Fiorentina. In other words, as long as Fiorentina wins in this round, then third-placed Parma will pose no threat to Fiorentina at all; Moreover, if Juventus is really defeated by Udinese in Zuihou, then the Purple Lily can lock up the Serie A title seven rounds in advance!
As a result, the morale-boosting Fiorentina players continued to work hard in the second half, first Inzaghi completed his hat-trick in the 57th minute, and then Crews, who came on as a substitute for Barty, also scored a goal in the 78th and 83rd minutes of the game to set the score at 6-0 with a brace!
When the match against Piacenza ended, the Fiorentina players did not celebrate the victory on the pitch, but rushed to the bench as soon as possible, looking at their manager Capello with anticipation, hoping to get the results from him at the Alp Stadium as soon as possible.
"Everyone, you have to be mentally prepared......" Seeing that the players were staring at him with a longing face, Capello, who was extremely thick-skinned, also had a little red cheeks, sighed, and said with a sad face.
When the Fiorentina players saw the manager's expression, they said that Juventus was really tenacious enough to complete the reversal in the second half, and it seemed that the day of celebration would be postponed by another week......
And just when the players felt a little frustrated, Capello's expression suddenly changed, and a bottle of champagne was conjured out from behind him, opened the bottle at a very fast speed, and slammed it towards the players: "The Juventus guys lost 0-3 at home to Udinese!" Lads! Celebrate! We are already Serie A champions! ”