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Will Pier Luigi Penzo be underwater before 2050??

No context just worries

Thomas Henry with a world-class performance

A hat-trick in the first half. An assist in the second half. What can't Thomas Henry do? T. Henri (no not that one) has been flying for Lagunari as of recent with his goal tally now reaching 6. After a slow start to a debut season for Venezia, he now has taken command of the attacking duo up front, not only making himself look good but helping whoever he is paired up with perform. Against Genoa, Musa Juwara netted his first goal of the season off a killer ball pass from Henry to silence the critics in the media.

“Nights like this I would take him over Kylian Mbappe," Flingy Floriano said after the match.

Lagunari end 8 game winless streak

We are well into the season, and Venezia already finds itself with their back against the wall in 20th. Flingy Floriano has been wracking his head around what to do, trying to tactics in practice, holding team meetings, anything to get the club back on track. Not to mention the board is now breathing down his neck.

The Fiorentina game brought more pressure as the team truly needed to get a win or slip deeper into a relegation whole that would be hard to climb out of. Luckily, Floriano had a plan. The first was a tactic switch, moving from Gegenpress to Route One football. The objective here was to play a more direct football style as stats showed an underperforming level of key passes completed and passes lost. Next was a formation change, moving to a 4-1-3-2 which better-suited player roles and positions already within the team. Lastly, cut instructions down and just play simple football.

Match day arrived and the media members in the briefing were going ballistic about the benching of Nani. “Nani has a role in this style for sure but we are still working on finding it”. He did ultimately make an appearance up front but not until the 67th minute.

Venezia hit the ground running in front of 5,100 fans at Pier Luigi Penzo with an early goal from David Okereke. A back and forth matched followed but Venice ultimately dominated position and found the back of the net again in the 57th minute with the help of Thomas Henry. Is this the season turnover Floriano needs to keep the floating city afloat in Serie A?

Domen Crnigoj early season hero!

In the first competitive match of the season, the Venetians took home a nail-biter win against Crotone in the opening round of the Coppa Italia. The game was not expected to be as close as it was but Gianluca Saro stopped nearly every single shot Venezia sent at him. In a dramatic penalty shootout, Domen Crnigoj, the midfielder who had a mediocre game up until that point became a hero slotting it past Saro to win the game.

Editor's Notes:

• Obviously can't implement “climate sustainability efforts” but open to suggestions
• Not a full Build a Nation save but will try and grow some American talent without overwhelming the squad

Dan “Flingy” Floriano arrives by boat

After last year's promotion, Duncan Niederauer, the American chairman and owner of the historic team was ready to fight the relegation battle in Serie A. But Neiderauer also has bigger plans for Venezia with glimmers of European football on the near horizon. Concerns around Paolo Zanetti's tactic plans at the highest level of Italian football made the board nervous and decided it was time to look elsewhere for a relegation expert. Neiderauer also hoped to find someone who would match his ideals of building American talent within the club and giving them a stepping stone to Europe, eventually growing the game back in the states. There is also the challenge of marketing, meeting a Gucci-esque level of aesthetic in Italy's most picturesque city.

A call eventually reached Dan “Flingy” Floriano, a 38-year-old American coach who had been appointed as Empoli's assistant coach two years ago while the team was battling to get back into Serie A. Prior to that, he had worked as the U18 Head Coach at Sunderland in England, surviving staffing cut after cut as the team dropped from the Premier League down to League One. He also has experience coaching in the US, working as Head Coach at the semi-pro Western Mass Pioneers side and spending five years as the UMass Lowell Head Coach, taking them to two Elite 8 games and 1 Final 4 game. 

The board is looking for a coach to help the team play defensively solid soccer while also being entertaining to support the “brand” of Venice. This is where Flingy comes in and why his nickname matters. Floriano is known for emphasizing long ball and crossing while building strong defense back lines. $498k and a two-year contract later, Flingy is now the new Head Coach of the Venezia with hopes to make those glimmers in Neiderauer's eyes a reality. His first announcement as the new HC, not only make the club's recent growth sustainable and fight the relegation battle but also make the club environmentally stable to represent the changes needed to save cities like Venice.

Venice is expected to be completely underwater by 2100 if things do not change with urgent climate action. By 2030, regular flooding could become an issue. By 2050, parts of the city could be uninhabitable. By 2100, it would be likely the entire historic city would be underwater. The goal of this save - win a Scudetto for a city of class and elegance that has never seen a championship boat parade, all by 2050 before Pier Luigi Penzo is underwater.

October 2021:

Well…an even more poor run of form lead to a 4-0 defeat on the road against Monopoli. The board met that night and decided Piabi's time was up. The American experiment clearly had failed.

Joe Piabi is now unemployed and likely to go back to the US for another try at coaching.

Editor's Note:

Not the start I expected to journaling my FM saves but we will be back again with something hopefully a bit more successful.

September 2021:

A poor start to the season for Il Delfini after only taking 6 points from 6 league games. 27 supporters showed up to the Serie C Cup game to start the stadium, making it difficult for the players to get excited in a basically empty 27,000-seat stadium. This likely helped cause their early exit from the cup. Prior to an away match at Palermo, someone slipped the book Zonal Marking under Piabi's hotel door and he stayed up all night reading it from front to back. The next day, at the tactical meeting he introduced a not yet seen 4-2-3-1 to the team, hoping this would help against the biggest team in the league yet saw them lose 4-0. Training the next day immediately saw a switch back to Taranto's standard 5-2-3.

League Position:

13th

Upcoming Key Match(s):

Away at Monopoli

Key Player:

Davide di Gennaro (Midfielder) with match rating avg. of 7.22

Season 1 Pre-Season:

The bus was the team's second home as we played every pre-season match on the road around Apulia. Only one slip up in the first game against Bitonto meant ending in a draw 1-1 but we picked things up after finding our preferred formation. Rocking a 5-2-3, we scored 12 goals over four pre-season matches and only allowed two into the back of the net. 

Key Player to Watch:

34-year-old Mario Pacilli might play a bigger role than expected this season after scoring 4 goals, getting 2 assists, and a hat-trick in two pre-season matches.

Only three teams from south of Rome have won the Scudetto. Two of those wins were from Naples. In 2012, a new ownership group took over Taranto with hopes of being the next team on that list however have seen failure after failure to get above Serie C. After issues with the coaching staff, the owners decided to shake things up and bring in an outsider. Previously at the University of New Hampshire, Joe Piabi, an American college coach, is here to turn things around for “i delfini”. While only 31 years old, Piabi has already seen success in the US on the collegiate level. Can he now compete in Europe? Can he meet Taranto's ambitions? We shall see in…The Italian Job.