(The tape recorder clicks on. I’m still wearing yesterday’s shirt because I genuinely could not be bothered to change after the Ajax game. There is a faint smell of Prosecco somewhere in the office that I am choosing not to investigate.)
Act I: The Miracle at the Franchi
Right. I need everyone to sit down for this one, because I still don’t entirely believe it happened.
Wednesday 11th March, Champions League Round of 16, second leg, Ajax at the Franchi, 0-3 down from the first leg. I told the press we couldn’t be too disappointed with that scoreline. I lied. I was extremely disappointed. But 42,481 people turned up anyway, which either says something about Florentine loyalty or Florentine masochism.
We flew out of the blocks. Valentín Carboni pounced on a horrendous Ko Itakura error inside three minutes, teed up by Harvey Elliott, and suddenly the tie was alive. Samu Omorodion — yes, him, the one with the ligaments — doubled our night’s tally on 22 minutes with a close-range volley, assisted by Fabiano Parisi, who I will come back to, because Parisi’s evening deserves its own paragraph.
Then Manu Koné decided the best use of his evening was a needless tackle in the 24th minute and an early bath. Ten men, one leg of a Champions League tie to save, and I remember thinking, with total sincerity, “well, that’s that, then.”
It was not, in fact, that.
- Omorodion got his second — our third of the night — on 37 minutes, again teed up by Parisi, to level the tie on aggregate.
- Endrick made it four on 62 minutes after another Ajax mistake, VAR intervening to overturn an initial offside call, putting us ahead on aggregate with ten men on the pitch.
I dialled the aggression back a touch after that, because I am not a complete lunatic, and we promptly spurned two gilt-edged chances in the same passage of play — which, with this squad, felt less like misfortune and more like muscle memory. Ajax went straight down the other end, Roger Ibañez switched off, and Oscar Gloukh punished us for it on 83 minutes. Down to ten men, nerves absolutely shredded, I pushed us forward again anyway, and Harvey Elliott popped up in the 90th minute with the goal that finished the job.
Fiorentina 5, Ajax 1. Aggregate: 5-4. I jumped out of my seat in the technical area like a man twenty years younger. I did not think we had this in us. Samu Omorodion — delicate ligaments, food poisoning, general air of a man his body has personally wronged — finished the night with a 9.8 rating, two assists, and two goals. Fabiano Parisi finished with a 9.0 and two assists from left-back. We are, somehow, in the Champions League quarter-finals.
Act II: Cagliari, and the Case of the Second Red Card in a Week
Three days later, Cagliari at home, and I’d love to tell you we cruised it. We dominated — 2.51 xG to their 0.72, 56% possession — but it took until the 58th minute for Nicolò Fagioli to actually break the deadlock, assisted by Omorodion. Simone Pafundi doubled the lead on 78 minutes, set up by Carboni.
In between those two goals, Amir Richardson went down making a tackle in the 64th minute and didn’t get back up — a broken lower arm, out somewhere between six and nine weeks depending on how sensible we decide to be about it. And then, because apparently one red card a week isn’t enough for this squad, Fabiano Parisi — hero of Amsterdam three days earlier — was sent off in the 80th minute. We rode out the closing stages with ten men for the second match running, helped this time by Cagliari missing the chances we were too tired to stop them having.
Fiorentina 2, Cagliari 0. Parisi now misses the crucial game against Milan through suspension, which is a genuinely painful way to pay for the two best assists of his season.
Act III: Iain, Predictably, Also Goes Through
I would love to report that Iain’s Lazio crashed out of the Champions League this week, ideally on penalties, ideally in the rain. Instead, Lazio beat Manchester City 7-5 on aggregate, ending City’s twelve-game unbeaten home run in the process, and progressed to the quarter-finals alongside us, Bayern Munich, Barcelona, Liverpool, Inter, PSG and Real Madrid. That is, by any measure, an obscene set of company to be keeping — genuine European royalty, plus us, plus Iain, who I am now fairly certain believes his own hype. He went through. I went through. The rest of Europe’s elite went through. I’m choosing to view our inclusion on that list as either the best thing that’s happened to this club in years, or an administrative error UEFA haven’t noticed yet.
Act IV: The Transfer Rumour Mill Never Sleeps
Even mid-week Champions League miracles don’t stop the phone ringing. Saudi money has come in for Elia Caprile — £14 million, which tells you what the market thinks of a backup goalkeeper who’s barely sniffed the first team since Christmas. Brighton are sniffing around Vitaly Janelt. Both Pio Esposito and Valentín Carboni are attracting interest of their own, and with Omorodion finally hitting form, Lucca offering a genuine plan B, and Endrick capable of playing through the middle as well as wide, it might finally be time to let my Italian son go and spread his wings elsewhere — I said back in the winter I’d sell him without a second thought, and nothing since has changed my mind, however many Champions League nights he’s part of.
Carboni, for what it’s worth, looks like a proper rotation option now rather than a luxury. It’s probably Albert Guðmundsson who makes more sense to move on, especially with Mattia Zaccagni reportedly incoming to add some experience out wide. Which, if it happens, tells you everything about the state of our flanks this season — we are going to have injuries out wide whoever’s wearing the shirt, it’s basically written into the club’s DNA at this point.
And then there’s Richardson. Broken arm, six to nine weeks out if he’s sensible about it, and he’s already told the physio he intends to play through it like a trooper. This is the same Amir Richardson who, not long ago, was one of two players quietly grumbling that my team talks were too harsh. Apparently nothing builds team spirit quite like getting your arm broken for the cause. I’m not sure what lesson to take from that, except that I should probably ease off before somebody actually needs the physio’s full attention.
We sit third. 58 points from 28 games, above Bologna on games played, breathing down Napoli’s neck, and somehow through to a Champions League quarter-final with the biggest names in the sport. It’s been an odd few weeks.
Next time: Milan, without Parisi, with a suspension-shaped hole at left-back and a European quarter-final now looming behind it.
