The Bergamaschi in free fall, now also risk a place in the next Champions League. Gasperini’s toy broke into the heart of winter, the season is below expectations
TO Gian Piero Gasperini You don’t like the word “collapse” and not even that it is discussed if in the difficulties of theAtalanta There may be a role to be assigned to the announcement by himself that the cycle in Bergamo is destined to close. Or in June, or at the natural expiration of the contract in 2026. Words gave on 22 February last, in the middle of an winter that has gradually frozen all the Atalantine dreams to the point of falling the season finale from the paradise of the Scudetto struggle to the Purgatory of that for a place in the next Champions League. Not too far from the hell of those who will have to stay out, licking the wounds.
Not to mention the collapse or the future of its technician, it is sufficient to say that 2025 of Atalanta resembles an inclined plane whose end is not seen. The one with Lazio was the third consecutive defeat after the dazzling of the Sacco di Torino (0-4 at Juventus) who had officially enrolled the Bergamo players at the race for the title. Not even a month has passed – it was March 9 – but a geological era seems to have passed. The signals, however, were already before and were covered by the braking of Napoli and the inability of the Inter to kill the championship.
Signals that can be translated into numbers: 16 points in 12 days in the return group, half -ranking stuff, only 5 games won in all competitions in the 19 played players (Como, Verona, Empoli, the aforementioned Juventus and the Sturm Graz), a home performance from the relegation zone since the last success dates back to December 22 and from then on only 4 points were collected at 21 available. A plan that has tilt well before Gasperini’s words and, therefore, it is possible that the same were a symptom of discomfort and not the trigger of the crisis.
Antonio Percassi is wisely trying to change the inertia of a story that seems over (“I would like it to remain”) and it may be that it does it for immediate convenience as well as for sincere conviction. Atalanta needs a positive shock because the situation has become emotionally complex, with the pursuers who are now at a shot and a vague feeling of inevitability that is the worst possible opponent for a prolonged break team.
Atalanta continues to be a wonderful example for Italian football and nothing will change the historical judgment on Gasperini’s decade at the Percassi court. However, for the fold that is taking the season, you can also start saying that the results are not consistent with expectations and investments and that a wire of disappointment is understandable. Who, last summer, had told the Atalantini fans who played for the Scudetto in March would have been taken for crazy. But also those who at the end of December had predicted an immediate exclusion from the Champions League, the Italian Cup, the Italian Super Cup and not to celebrate a victory at Gewiss who knows how much, he would have had identical fate.
The calendar does not help, now offering Bologna and travel to San Siro against Milan in rapid sequence. Then he wins, but the psychosis risk is concrete. Atalanta ate the advantage that she had deservedly built during the season, the ending depends only on her.
