Who’d a Thunk It?

By: Marco | December 11th, 2007

Roma came in to the Picchi on Sunday with the idea of taking an easy 3 points from Tuscan minnows. But Roma fell into the Bermuda Triangle that is Tuscany. The red and yellow boys seem to have contracted Tuscanitis or something, they can’t seem to get a decent result in Luciano Spalletti’s native region. Giancarlo Camolese outwitted the Roman tactician all afternoon. Livorno even had a great chance of winning this game if not for the prowess’s of The Doni, Roma’s schizophrenic goaltender.

Livorno got a deserved point on Saturday afternoon after holding 2nd place AS Roma to a 1-1 tie. After Inter earlier this year, it was Roma’s time to knock their heads on Livorno’s defensive wall.

As we all know by now, Diego Tristan embarrassed Mateo Ferrari to score a beauty on a solo effort to tie the game at 1-1 at the 6-minute mark. The Spaniard celebrated his first Italian goal by sucking his thumb. Marco Amelia and the Difesa Labronica took care of the Roman attack while Diego Tristan and Francesco Tavano took on Roma’s pourous Defence. Livorno shot 9 times on goal to Roma’s 6, all that considering the Amaranti we’re defending in a way Helenio Herrera would have been proud of. Diego Tristan went down in the box late in the game, on what seemed to be a clear foul if you ask me, and with a little more luck , Tavano could have added at least another one on the scoreboard during the 2nd half. I have the feeling that if Martin Bergvold was in that game, the link between midfield and attack would have been much better.

*For highlights you can go here for bitching and moaning you can head on to the Roma Offside.

Livorno had the stars aligned in their favor for this one. The Pitch was heavy, Totti wasn’t in the game mentally, Matteo Ferrari was defending and Diego Tristan was looking all 2001 again. Livorno gave away the first goal on a stupidly defended corner kick with De Rossi heading one in while Amelia was calling Rosella Sensi from the sidelines. Another Set piece, another goal. The romans had one goal disallowed on a header and hit a crossbar, the Amaranti need to work on crosses in the box goddamnit!

The thing that helped Livorno all afternoon was the fact that Luciano Spalletti seems to not really know he’s allowed to substitute players. Giancarlo Camolese felt so bad for Roma that he even sent Persian stopper extraordinaire Rezaei to make things interesting. But it’s a good thing Roma didn’t get the memo about how you’re allowed to score with your head more than once a game.

Roma Chris sums it up well ;

It still appears as this team has fallen in love with the extra pass, trying to score the perfect goal instead of playing the percentages, playing for a rebound or such, which they would do well to try every now and again. Clearly their biggest advantage was through the air, as the lanes were clogged and thus vision limited. I would have liked to have seen the Pizza Man split out a little further to the flanks and send in his cross instead of continually bouncing passes off of (or to) the maroon jerseys. Does anybody think a nice target man would have done well here? Maybe, oh, I don’t know, an Erjon Bogdani?

Ha! That’s exactly what the Amaranti need to work on, Thanks to Roma we didn’t have to defend against a legitimate aerial threat all game. Livorno deserved 2 points for this game at least; they pulled a Scotland on France out there on Sunday.

Player Ratings:

Amelia: He wanted to impress Rosella real bad, even if he had a decent game; he wasn’t the best goalie out there today. He fucked up royally on the first goal but saved a couple of sure goals after that. Same old Marco. Vote 6.5

Tavano: He and Tristan are getting more and more familiar with each other. With a little bit more luck, or talent, Ciccio should have scored at least one.
Voto 6.5

Tristan:. Amazing goal! He ‘s alone against the Roma defense and manages to score a beauty. Every time he touches the ball he seems to dribble past at least one player. Served a great assist to Fillipini that could have sealed the game in Livorno’s favor.
Vote 9

il Presidente breaks his silence and praises Johnny Camels:

Aldo Spinelli has to be happy with his team’s recennt run. The crazy president broke his silenzio stampa sunday to talk about his team: