Want To Lose Your Job?

Want to lose your job? Sign on with a Serie A side and wait about six months. Nine, count ‘em, nine Serie A managers have been fired this year, and another has quit under pressure from above. Serse Cosmi, always fun to watch on the sidelines, was the latest in a long list to see the door. I’m going to keep a running tab because I’m pretty darn certain the bloodletting isn’t done yet.

Cosmi (Udinese)
Del Neri (Palermo)
Baldini (Lecce)
Tesser (Cagliari)
Rossi (Treviso)
Somma (Empoli)

and three others, who escape me at the moment. I’ll have to dig it up. And in the ”
Jumped before he got pushed” category:

Donadoni (Livorno)

Granted, if you’re in the ‘drop zone’ you have to do something, anything, to stay up. And usually that means giving the manager the boot. But ‘may not qualify for Europe’ shouldn’t mean ‘ciao’ automatically, and certainly not in December or January. Teams take time to gel, it’s as simple as that. And if you buy or sell a couple key components, things might take weeks or months before you have consistent results, good or bad. You want to know why Real Madrid has struggled so much the last couple years? Look at the number of line-up changes. You wonder why Juventus was so successful under Lippi? Look at how many core players stayed year in and year out.