The feeling at their home stadium was far from happy during the weekend fixture. Lazio were trailing against Torino, a side that had let in ten goals while scoring only two in their last five league matches. Ultras from the Curva Nord were concluding their most recent demonstration in a continuous dispute with club owner Claudio Lotito.
The Campaign Falling Apart?
Had their campaign coming unstitched, or did there exist a thread keeping it intact from the beginning? The club brought back Maurizio Sarri as manager this summer, only for him to later acknowledge that the board had omitted to inform him about a registration embargo they were facing for accounting issues. Rumours that he could resign were unfounded, but he did say that Lotito had "swindled" him.
The Roman club were just as chaotic on the pitch as they were off it, defeating Verona 4-0 and Genoa 3-0 but losing the rest of their first five games, which included the capital clash. From one game to the next, it's been difficult to tell if they're getting better or self-destructing.
Cancellieri's Unforeseen Comeback
At least one man kept smiling amid the chaos. Matteo Cancellieri had not been expected to be at Lazio during this campaign. He was on the previous campaign at Parma as a loanee and, during the summer break, his owning club were pushing for him to stay there for another season. The registration embargo forced a rethink. They were unable to thin their squad with no new signings.
He signed originally when Sarri was last in charge, back then just 20 years old graduate of Verona's academy. He made 20 matches in the league in Lazio colors in 2022-23, almost all of those as a substitute. The club's longtime sporting director, Igli Tare, who left following that term, subsequently claimed Sarri of "promising everyone Cancellieri would be a star but then not selecting him."
Discovering His Natural Fit
It's possible the coach was persistently working to work out the nature of the player's talent. Labeled as a wide forward when he joined, Cancellieri instead found himself the majority of that term as a struggling deputy to Ciro Immobile in the striker role. In 63 appearances during spells with Empoli and Parma during recent campaigns, he scored seven times. Shoehorn
