The year of Napoli and Scott McTominay: the Serie A season review

The Guardian

2 days ago

The season has barely ended and already it is clear Serie A will look very different next term. Five of the league's top 10 sides have parted ways with their managers and a sixth, Claudio Ranieri, is moving upstairs at Roma. More changes may soon follow, with Igor Tudor's future at Juventus uncertain and Como's Cesc Fàbregas drawing attention from richer clubs – including the runners-up, Inter, who need a replacement for Simone Inzaghi.
Could we equal the turnover of last summer, when 14 out of 20 teams got a new coach? It's not impossible, especially with several lower-half teams and their tacticians still exploring the options available.
So let us take a moment, before it is forgotten, to celebrate the 2024-25 campaign. It will be remembered above all for Napoli's fourth scudetto, and Antonio Conte becoming the first manager to win Serie A with three clubs; or the second, after Fabio Capello, for those who continue to reject the decision to strip Juventus of their 2005 and 2006 triumphs as punishment for Calciopoli scandal.
In Naples, they will remember this as the year of Scott McTominay, who joined from Manchester United at the end of August and went on to become Serie A's Most Valuable Player. He lacks the glittering gifts of their heroes before him – Khvicha Kvaratskhelia and Diego Maradona – but the man they call 'McFratm' – McBro – was relentlessly decisive, his 12 goals including eight that broke a deadlock in a goalless game
The Scottish influence in Serie A continues to grow. Billy Gilmour was a league winner alongside McTominay at Napoli, starting only 13 league games but delivering important performances, including one of his best in the scudetto-sealing win against Cagliari. Ché Adams joined Torino and scored 10 goals in all competitions.
Simone Inzaghi has been appointed coach of Al-Hilal, the Saudi Pro League side announced on Wednesday. The Italian left Inter on Tuesday after the side's humiliating 5-0 loss in the Champions League final against Paris Saint-Germain last Saturday, and has quickly taken on another managerial job.
The Saudi club did not immediately disclose any details about Inzaghi's contract, but Italian media reported that it could be worth up to €30m (£25.3m) per season. Inzaghi's first task will be to take charge of Al-Hilal at the Club World Cup in the US; they will face Real Madrid on 18 June in their group opener.
Earlier on Wednesday, Cesc Fàbregas pledged his immediate managerial future to Como amid speculation that the Spaniard is Inter's main target to replace Inzaghi.The former Arsenal, Barcelona and Chelsea midfielder has attracted the attention of several top clubs after leading promoted Como to 10th place in Serie A.
'I really believe in Como's long-term project, I arrived here as a player and I'm very, very happy because I can work here the way I want," Fàbregas, who is also a shareholder in the club he manages, said at the SXSW (South By Southwest) conference in London. Italian media have reported that Inter want to speak to Fàbregas after Inzaghi left by mutual agreement on Tuesday. Reuters
Lewis Ferguson, essential to Bologna's Champions League qualification a year ago, missed much of this season through injury but returned to captain his team to glory in the Coppa Italia – their first domestic trophy in more than half a century. Liam Henderson was relegated with Empoli, but Josh Doig is in line to replace him in Serie A after helping Sassuolo to promotion.
From top to second-bottom, this was an intensely competitive campaign. Not only the title race but places in every European competition and the final two relegation spots were all decided on the final weekend. For a moment it had even appeared that the top two might need to be separated by a playoff.
There were too many twists and turns to recall here, but certain images will linger in the memory. Riccardo Orsolini gleefully rapping on the lens of a TV camera after scoring the 93rd-minute scissor-kick winner for Bologna that began to unravel Inter's title bid. Pedro, a former Premier League champion under Conte, scoring his second equaliser for Lazio against the Nerazzurri – again in injury time – to stop them going top on the penultimate weekend.
Inter pursued every trophy and finished with none. They were even outdone here by their frequently dreadful neighbours, Milan, who came from 2-0 down to beat them in the Supercoppa final, the culmination of an astonishing first week in charge of the Rossoneri for Sérgio Conceição, whose team nevertheless finished eighth in the league.
His predecessor, Paulo Fonseca, had begun the season saying Milan were aiming to win the scudetto. By week three, he could not even persuade Rafael Leão and Theo Hernández to stand with their teammates during a cooling break.
Fonseca got plenty wrong, yet none of his missteps was so shameful as the ones his club made on the night they fired him – allowing him to give a post-game press conference at which everyone seemed to know his fate except for him. Finally informed of his termination shortly after, he had to announce it to journalists on the way out of the car park, since the club had still not released a statement.
Instead of Milan, it was Atalanta who threatened to muscle in on the title race, winning 11 games in a row before fading to third. Bologna, Roma, Lazio and Fiorentina had turns at challenging for fourth. They were beaten to it by Juventus, who broke a habit and changed manager with the season ongoing. Tudor drove more than 600 miles from his home in Croatia to take the job. His choice, and the club's, was vindicated.
The relegation battle was similarly close-fought, all apart from Monza, who started and finished poorly under Alessandro Nesta. They were equally bad when Salvatore Bocchetti replaced him for seven games in the middle. Selling several starters in January did not help, but the Berlusconi family have made clear they are no longer interested in sustaining a loss-making football club, and are seeking a new buyer.
Venezia, too, paid the price for mid-season trading – unable to find a replacement goalscorer after Joel Pohjanpalo left for Palermo. Empoli join them in dropping down to Serie B, overtaken at the last by a Lecce side for whom the goalkeeper Wladimiro Falcone was the hero. The team from the heel of Italy's boot will play a fourth consecutive season of top-flight football for the first time.
Again, though, we are getting ahead of ourselves. It is time now for the end-of-season Bandini awards:
10) David Neres goes for a run against Fiorentina.
9) There's something deeply satisfying about the dip on this strike from Jurgen Ekkelenkamp.
8) Pick your own favourite between Nicolò Barella's gems against Lazio and Atalanta.
7) Adams from the centre circle.
6) Moise Kean, on the turn and on the volley.
5) Mandatory annual overhead kick section: Saúl Coco for Torino and Rolando Mandragora for Fiorentina.
4) New-this-year scissor kick section: Riccardo Orsolini v Scott McTominay.
3) Matías Soulé gets extra points for doing this in the second half of a Rome derby his team were losing. Someone in Serie A's video team liked it so much they set it to music in slow-motion.
2) Ange-Yoan Bonny's through-the-legs-and-in-off-the-woodwork heel flick was good. But Dan Ndoye's was better.
1) The volleyed finish from Paulo Dybala was wonderful, but it's the buildup play and backheel assist from Artem Dovbyk that make this one special.
Amin Sarr for Verona v Atalanta.
Luca Mazzitelli for Como v Lazio.
The wind in Venice, carrying Gaetano Oristanio's corner straight past Pepe Reina.
Lorenzo Lucca's penalty earned Udinese three points away to Lecce, yet nobody celebrated with him. The striker had claimed the ball for himself when a spot-kick was awarded in the 27th minute, despite the fact Florian Thauvin was the designated taker and even after half their team rushed over to remonstrate with him. Lucca buried it into the top corner but was snubbed by his colleagues and subbed off before half-time. 'Nobody's bigger than the team,' the manager Kosta Runjaic said at the time. Not even their 6ft 7in top scorer.
McTominay is the easy, and correct, choice. There were others who deserve a mention: Mateo Retegui's 25 goals for Atalanta were six more than anyone else managed, Nico Paz was electric for Como and Kean produced the best season of his career for Fiorentina.
But McTominay stood up repeatedly in key moments for a Napoli team who rarely had the luxury of an easy three points, winning 13 times by a goal. At first the 'Jolly', whose adaptability allowed him to fit in where the team needed, by the end McTominay had become the man that the whole system was built around, following the departure of Kvaratskhelia.
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Mile Svilar (Roma); Amir Rrahmani (Napoli), Berat Djimsiti (Atalanta), Alessandro Bastoni (Inter); Riccardo Orsolini (Bologna), Tijjani Reijnders (Milan), Scott McTominay (Napoli), Mattia Zaccagni (Lazio); Nico Paz (Como); Mateo Retegui (Atalanta), Moise Kean (Fiorentina)
Player I'm most annoyed not to have squeezed into that XI: Marcus Thuram (Inter)
Ranieri was always going to have a bumpy start to his final stint at Roma. Returning to a club that had already gone through two managers by mid-November, his first league games in charge were against Napoli and Atalanta. His Giallorossi lost both, beat Lecce then suffered another defeat away to Como.
For the remaining 22 rounds of the season after that, though, Ranieri's Roma were statistically the best team in Serie A – taking 53 points. The closest sides behind them in this stretch, Inter and Napoli, managed 47 each.
Roma ultimately fell a point short of the Champions League places, but even qualifying for the Europa League was a major achievement given the mess he inherited. His most lasting impact might simply have been to heal rifts between the club and a fanbase who were outraged by the ownership's treatment of Daniele De Rossi.
Honourable mentions: So, so many. It feels outrageous not to give the prize to Conte for taking over a Napoli team who finished 10th last season, and who sold Kvaratskhelia without a replacement in January, having already sent the other great hero of their 2023 scudetto win, Victor Osimhen, off to Galatasaray on loan.
But I also want to acknowledge the work done by Gian Piero Gasperini at Atalanta. His methods at times seemed questionable – labelling Ademola Lookman 'one of the worst penalty takers I've ever seen', but the results are undeniable.
Atalanta lost their starting No 9, Gianluca Scamacca, to a cruciate ligament tear in August and were without one of their brightest young talents, Giorgio Scalvini, for most of the season too. Teun Koopmeiners was sold to Juventus in the summer and Lookman missed the start of the campaign amid reports that he, too, was lobbying for a transfer. Despite all that, Atalanta finished third, again.
Fàbregas also did impressive work at Como, but I wanted to highlight Raffaele Palladino, too. He reinvigorated the careers of so many players this year at Fiorentina – from Kean to Robin Gosens and David De Gea and even navigated a traumatic chapter for his club with Edoardo Bove's cardiac arrest. Having chosen to walk away at the end of the season, it will be fascinating to see where Palladino lands next.
Fiorentina's David de Gea pulls out three in a row against Como.
The Derby d'Italia in October, when Inter led 1-0 then trailed 2-1, led 4-2 and ultimately drew 4-4 against Juventus was an utterly unhinged game of football, as well as a magical one for the then 19-year-old Kenan Yildiz, who scored the last two goals. We should have known then that Inter were no longer the trustworthy defensive unit we watched last season. 'The neutrals like you enjoyed yourselves,' Inzaghi said to a giddy Sky Sport studio at full-time. 'Me, a little bit less.'
Christian Pulisic.
'The mental side of the game will be fundamental,' the then-Lecce manager Luca Gotti said before his team hosted Fiorentina in October. They lost 6-0, with Antonino Gallo sent off before half-time.
After taking over at Juventus in March, Tudor told a press conference he had already heard from one player's famous father: 'I spoke to Lilian Thuram yesterday on the phone. He told me: 'If my son Khéphren does anything wrong, you can slap him.''
Lilian Thuram again, this time watching his older son, Marcus, score against his own former club, Parma.
Napoli fans trying to say Scott McTominay's name (before they came up with something better.
Conte and Napoli finished as scudetto winners, but that didn't stop him from getting in a few classic moans along the way. Greatest among them might have been his lament that 'the pitch was not watered, and the ball wouldn't run' after a 0-0 draw at Venezia. 'It's the first time something like this has happened all year. I asked [Venezia manager] Eusebio [Di Francesco] if that was their choice but he said it wasn't.' The broadcaster Dazn responded on Venezia's behalf, posting a video of the pitch being watered on four separate occasions, before kick-off and at half-time.
Down 1-0 at home against Lazio in April, Atalanta sought to change the dynamic of the game by replacing the midfielder Éderson with the more attacking Lazar Samardzic. Unfortunately, Mirco Moioli, responsible for conveying substitutions to the fourth official, misheard Gasperini's instruction to take off 'Ede' as a call to replace 'Ade' – the forward Ademola Lookman. By the time they realised, the board had gone up and it was too late to do anything about it. As Gasperini observed at full-time: 'You could see this wasn't our day.'
I've saved the last word this season for Ranieri, reflecting on Roma's 1-1 draw with Lazio in April. That result, earned from a losing position, allowed him to retire undefeated as a manager in Rome derbies. But it also was the first one he had failed to win.
'I thought about that before and after,' Ranieri said. 'As a fan it's very beautiful to finish undefeated, though I would have liked to close with one more win. But this is football: sometimes it gives you beautiful things, other times less beautiful. You need to know how to accept it.'