Atalanta v Torino: How the Hell Did That Happen?

By: Martha | October 21st, 2007

Toro rule. For the first 65 minutes of this match, I was writing a post in my head about how Atalanta were going on the run I talked about last week, and how, when Alessandro Rosina is closely marked and they’re without Alvaro Recoba, Torino have no chance to score whatsoever. And then, just after Atalanta went up 2-0 and Cesare Natali was sent off, 10-man Torino woke up and all hell broke loose.

I still can’t figure out exactly how it happened, but Atalanta’s concentration faltered and their incredibly organized defense, well, wasn’t. Torino suddenly managed to keep the ball (for the first time, literally, since the 16th minute) and launch easily their best attacks of the match. Rosinaldo was behind both goals, launching the ever-running Gianluca Comotto in up the line for the first; Comotto’s cross from the corner hit Nicola Ventola perfectly in the middle of the chest (Channel 4 says it was his head, but I really think it was a bit lower) and went in, thus giving Torino just a sniff of hope with 15 minutes to play. Then, three minutes from the end, Rosina played in a long cross from the right, again finding Ventola. This time his header was blocked, but substitute Marco Motta scrambled after the deflection and lifted it over Ferdinando Coppola for a miraculous second goal. Despite four hours of injury time, Torino held on and are going home deliriously happy with yet another tie.

Until the last 15 minutes, though, things really didn’t look good for Toro. They showed against Juve that they’re capable of being very hard to play against — they’re experienced and know exactly what they need to do to close down space and keep teams from play their game, even if it is by fouling really a lot — but that’s not always going to be enough. The problem is that they need someone not named Rosina who is creative on the ball and, when Recoba is hurt, there isn’t anyone else. Or, if there is, he’s hiding really well. That said, 18-year-old striker Dominique Malonga got nearly 30 minutes today, and he looked eager to run at people when he got the chance. Granted, it didn’t really come off very well, but intention is the first step, right?

Oh, and also, Ferreira Pinto scored a great goal for Atalanta in first-half injury time. It just sort of faded in importance as the match went on.