Serie A Weekend Round-up: Giornata 38 – Plus some coaching news

By: Francesco | June 1st, 2009

The last day of the season was a Sunday of goodbyes. Goodbye Maldini (retirement), goodbye Nedved (retirement, but may come back with another team), goodbye Figo (retirement, desk job with Inter probably), goodbye Ancelotti (Chelsea), goodbye Mazzarri (has to look for a team), goodbye Zenga (all signs are pointing towards Lazio, but maybe taking a year off), goodbye Quagliarella (signed for Napoli), goodbye Torino, Lecce, and Reggina (Serie B), goodbye Milito and Thiago Motta (off to Inter), goodbye Serie A every weekend, and then the two almost goodbyes that will be followed all summer by the press are those of Ibrahimovic and Kaka (who if reports are right will be playing each other in La Liga next season). Results after the jump.

Bologna-Catania 3-1
Scorers: 5´ Mingazzini (Bol); 26´ Terzi (Bol); 50´ Morimoto (Cat);
68´ Di Vaio (Bol)
Report. Player Ratings. Highlights.

Fiorentina-Milan 0-2
Scorers: 55´ Kaka’ (Mil); 76´ Pato (Mil)
Report. Player Ratings. Highlights.

Genoa-Lecce 4-1
Scorers: 23´ Jankovic (Gen); 33´ Tiribocchi (Lec); 53´ Criscito (Gen);
55´ Milito (Gen); 66´ Milito (Gen)
Report. Player Ratings. Highlights.

Inter-Atalanta 4-3
Scorers: 6´ Muntari (Int); 10´ Doni (Ata); 12´ Ibrahimovic (Int);
25´ Cigarini (Ata); 53´ Doni (Ata); 80´ Cambiasso (Int); 81´ Ibrahimovic (Int)
Report. Player Ratings. Highlights.

Juventus-Lazio 2-0
Scorers: 3´ Iaquinta (Juv); 59´ Iaquinta (Juv)
Report. Player Ratings. Highlights.

Napoli-Chievo 3-0
Scorers: 3´ Montervino (Nap); 7´ Bogliacino (Nap); 19´ Pia’ (Nap)
Report. Player Ratings. Highlights.

Palermo-Sampdoria 2-2
Scorers: 7´ Miccoli (Pal); 40´ Succi (Pal); 45´ Pazzini (Sam);
60´ Stankevicius (Sam)
Report. Player Ratings. Highlights.

Reggina-Siena 1-1
Scorers: 45´ rig. Stuani (Reg); 76´ Maccarone (Sie)
Report. Player Ratings. Highlights.

Roma-Torino 3-2
Scorers: 9´ Vailatti (Tor); 35´ Menez (Rom); 74´ Vucinic (Rom);
83´ rig. Totti (Rom); 88´ Ventola (Tor)
Report. Player Ratings. Highlights.

Udinese-Cagliari 6-2
Scorers: 10´ Asamoah (Udi); 13´ Pepe (Udi); 16´ Floro Flores (Udi);
55´ rig. Acquafresca (Cag); 57´ Parola (Cag); 58´ Pasquale (Udi); 83´ Quagliarella (Udi);
90´ Ighalo (Udi)
Report. Player Ratings. Highlights.

SERIE A FINAL STANDINGS

Inter 84; Juventus 74; Milan 74; Fiorentina 68; Genoa 68; Roma 63; Udinese 58; Palermo 57; Cagliari 53; Lazio 50; Atalanta 47; Napoli 46; Sampdoria 46; Siena 44; Catania 43; Chievo 38; Bologna 37; Torino 34; Reggina 31; Lecce 30

-Inter win the Scudetto for the 17th time
-Inter, Juventus, and Milan qualify for Champions League group stage
-Fiorentina qualify for Champions League preliminary round
-Genoa, Roma, and Lazio qualify for Europa Cup
-Torino, Reggina, and Lecce relegated to Serie B
-Top Scorer is Zlatan Ibrahimovic with 25 goals, followed by Diego Milito and Marco Di Vaio with 24 goals.

The relegation of Torino just shows how poorly run the club was the past 2 years. Urbano Cairo has to take the blame for this relegation, as Torino had a team that was more than capable of finishing safely mid-table. The fact that he only hired a sporting director (Rino Foschi, ex-Palermo) in the middle of this season shows how inexperienced he was. Now Toro is in B and he’ll have to restructure the whole club, as many players are definitely leaving.

COACHING NEWS

As we know, Carlo Ancelotti has left to coach Chelsea, and Leonardo has taken his place as Milan boss.

It was funny seeing Ancelotti give his first ever interview in English today. I guess those English lessons went pretty well:

-Leonardo will keep Mauro Tassotti as his assistant.

-Yesterday, Walter Mazzarri announced that he would be leaving Sampdoria by mutual consent with the club. Today, Sampdoria announced that Gigi Del Neri would be taking over next season and will be presented to the press on Wednesday. What’s funny is that Del Neri didn’t get along very well with Cassano at Roma and even in his book Cassano stated “Out of all the coaches I feel sorry for the most, it has to be Del Neri. At that point I was just out of my mind and I gave him hell. Del Neri was a nice guy, but I couldn’t understand what the hell he was saying [Del Neri has a thick Northern Italian accent]. ‘Antonio blah blah blah’ he would say, and I would just nod my head and pretend I understood.” So it will be interesting to see if the reformed Cassano makes amends with Del Neri, or if Cassano will even be at Sampdoria at all.

-As of now, the following teams need new managers next season:
Atalanta, Catania, Juventus, and maybe Lazio and Palermo. Atalanta and Catania’s benches are completely vacant while we all know the Juventus situation (Ciro Ferrara, Antonio Conte, or Laurent Blanc). Claudio Lotito says he will make a decision for Lazio within a week (whether to keep Delio Rossi or hire a new manager, probably Walter Zenga or Walter Mazzarri). The Palermo situation is interesting. Usually it’s Maurizio Zamparini who fires coaches, but this time its Davide Ballardini himself who wants to leave (possibly to Atalanta). That will also be resolved next week.