Both Fiorentina and Monza have to postpone their appointment with the first success of their championshipat the Franchi, a match with an uncertain script ends 2-2. The opportunity seemed good for the Viola of the former Palladino – contested by his fans until June – but in reality the progress of the challenge showed the Brianza team capable of going up by two goals in the first half, only to then be caught up. Kean, just before the break, made the task less impossible for his team in the second half, capable of grabbing the equaliser however only in the late recovery, thanks to the header from Gosens, who was able to immediately stamp his stamp on the day he made his return to Serie A, also starting as a starter.
Palladino analyzed the race like this: “This time let’s talk about the glass half empty first: the first 20 minutes were very positive, we had the right attitude and it wasn’t a problem with the approach. But with the first ball put in we conceded a goal and we were afraid to play: that mustn’t happen, I’m interested in the reaction and I have to work on that. But we were good: down 2-0 we could have collapsed and instead we stayed in the game. We were good at reopening it, we were in control of the game and I had the feeling we could have equalised at any moment, it’s a shame we did it at the end. However, I liked the spirit and the sacrifice, it’s a team with great human values. Improving the aspects of the game is my job”.
This is instead the vision of his opposite, and successor on the Monza bench, Nesta: “There is a lot of regret. We were 2-0 up, but in the second half we gave up playing. We had 3-4 interesting moves, in the second half we gave the ball to them: you can’t spend 45 minutes in the box and hope to make it, you can’t run after your opponents the whole time. We needed a different second half”.