Author: Hans

Mr. Preziosi gave our coach Gian Piero Gasperini the 2 players he wanted the most. A real substitute to Matteo Ferrari who left Genoa to Besiktas (Turkey), 23 years old central defender Andrea Esposito of Lecce. The young defender already was selected this summer by Italian National team coach Lippi to play the match against Northern Ireland. The tall (1.91) and strong (85 kilos) defender was wanted by a lot of Serie A teams and already signed a pre-contract last month with A.S. Roma, but finally choose Genoa.

For years our team missed a real substitute to Ivan Juric, a defensive midfielder with a great tactical vision who can ‘read the match’. In Alberto Zapater the 24 years old captain of Real Zaragoza (Spain) we finally found him. The symbol of Real Zaragoza who was raised in the youth of the club choose Genoa after having several times contact with his former teammate with Zaragoza our topscorer of last year Diego Milito. The midfielder is named El Toro (The Bull) in Spain and was captain of his Spanish team.

Tonight Genoa plays at 18.00 hours against Olympique Nice (Serie A in France).

Tonight the new schedule of Serie A ’09-’10 was published by Lega Calcio. Genoa plays the first match in Luigi Ferraris on Sunday 23rd Augustus against A.S. Roma. The second match is 1 week later in Bergamo against Atalanta. The homederby takes place on Sunday 29th November, while the return is on 11th April 2010. The complete schedule including the playdates of the Europa League will be published on this site in a few days.

After beating Stubaital by 17-0 (topscorers Crespo and Floccari who both scored 3 times) and Rodengo Saiano (2-1, goals of Crespo and Sculli) the European adventure of Genoa started last Friday in Brussels against Anderlecht. The Belgium team already trained for 5 weeks because they play this week their first pre-round match of the Champions League, while Genoa only was in training for 11 days. Genoa got the support of 200 fans, including some Dutch members of Genoa Club Amsterdam.

Genoa started the match with the following team: Rubinho; Biava, Bocchetti, Moretti; Mesto, Kharja, Juric, Criscito; Sculli, Crespo and Jankovic. After 14 minutes Juhasz scored the opening goal, but only 12 minutes later our central midfieldplayer Houssine Kharja scored just outside the penaltyarea the equalizer: 1-1. Despite several chances both teams did not score anymore, so Genoa left Brussels with a draw.

Next Wednesday Genoa plays against Acqui (Serie D) and Saturday Olympique Nice is our following opponent. Wednesday 5th August we play in Reggio Emilia against their hometeam Reggiana (Serie C-1) and 3 days later we play against Pro Vercelli the team that was 7 times Champion of Italy in the past and now plays in Serie C-2. The pre-season ends with the match at Thursday 13th August in Spain against Villareal, exactly 7 days before the first match in the Europa League and 10 days before the start of Serie A.

 

The new season starts in just more than 2 weeks at Monday 13th July in Neustift. Genoa stays in Austria till Friday-morning 24th July when the team of Mr. Gasperini goes by plane towards Brussels to play in the evening against Belgium topteam Anderlecht, the former club of Anthony Vanden Borre. Maybe some of our members in Belgium and in the South of Holland have the opportunity to watch this preparingmatch to the first matches in Europa League at 20th and 27th August. 

Yesterday it was only hope, but today it becames true: Genoa bought the missing 50% of Bosko Jankovic of Palermo (€ 3,5 million) and enlarged the stay of Raffaele Palladino in our team with another year. Mr. Gasperini said 2 weeks ago that he wants a maximum of 22 line-up players in his selection. At this moment he can use the following 21 players:

Goalkeepers: Scarpi (and probably Rubinho or Sorrentino)

Defenders: Biava, Bocchetti, Criscito, Ferrari, Sokratis and Tomovic

Midfielders: Juric, Kharja, Mesto, Milanetto, Modesto, Paro, Pelé, Rossi and Vanden Borre

Strikers: Crespo, Floccari, Jankovic, Palladino and Sculli (and probably Dembélé)

 

The great season 2008-2009 was also the season that our 22 years old defenders Salvatore Bocchetti and Mimmo Criscrito definitively changed from talents into complete Serie A-players. Both players are at the moment in Sweden to play with Italy the European Championship for players below 21 years and are also close to the National team of Mr. Lippi. Today Genoa bought the last 50% of Criscito and paid Juventus € 5,5 million for that and last week the same deal was made with Frosinone (Serie B) about Bocchetti which costed around € 2 million. Tomorrow Mr. Preziosi also tries to keep the strikers Jankovic and Palladino with us and he probably also buys Moussa Dembélé of AZ Alkmaar. Besides all the good news it look likes our goalkeeper Rubinho leaves us.

Our loved President Enrico Preziosi already bought 10 players to substitute Diego Milito and Thiago Motta that leave Genoa to Inter. After the central strikers Sergio Floccari (Atalanta Bergamo, 27 years) and Hernan Crespo (Inter, 33 years) also arrived central defender Nedan Tomovic (Red Star Belgrado, 21 years), midfielder Vítor Hugo Gomes Passos (nickname Pelé; Porto, 21 years) and playmaker Houssine Kharja (Siena, 27 years). To have Milito and Motta Inter paid Genoa around € 25 million and 5 young players which were owned by the black and blue of Milano: central strikers Robert Acquafresca (21 years, last year with Cagliari) and Riccardo Meggiorini (23, Cittadella), midfielder Francesco Bolzoni (20, Inter) and the defenders Ivan Fatic (20, Salernitana) and Leonardo Bonucci (22, Pisa). Probably most of the “Inter-youngsters” will be rent next season to get more experienced because Mr. Gasperini wants a maximum of 22 players in his selection that starts the season at 13th July in Austria.