The phone call from Jesper Karlsson’s agent to Bologna is the first sign of the Swede in his Italian experience. Because after losing the national team – of which he was also one of the possible and eligible new stars – now he has also lost the chance to play in the Champions League, ending up outside the list for the groups. Eight games less to try to demonstrate that what happened last year – and in reality also in part of this year – was wrong, a mistake in a career that can happen.
So he will only have the championship to do it. Where he started (again) badly and also has different competition in his role. Usually it doesn’t matter what number you take, but when you have the 10 on your back you perhaps have the greatest responsibility to at least leave a mark. Karlsson has been ectoplasmic rather than episodic so far, despite the eleven million spent on his registration.
He played only seven games in Serie A last season. 345 minutes in total, 317 of which in the first five league games. Then only 28 minutes, a knee injury, a lot of bench time, another stop for the ankle, another bench time. In short, a more disastrous season was difficult to conceive. Also because he was coming off a year with 33 games, 13 goals and 8 assists between the Eredivisie, Conference League and Dutch Cup. It would seem almost impossible to do worse, but the exclusion from the Champions League list can have two possibilities: either awaken him from the torpor in which he has been for so long, or sink him definitively. There has already been a reaction, even if perhaps not the expected one.