Pre-match

Giuseppe Iachini chose to leave Franck Ribery out of the squad and use Federico Chiesa up top instead. Siniša Mihajlović didn’t do anything too surprising.

First half

Second half

After Gaetano Castrovilli finally showed off some composure in the area, holding up a loose ball and feeding Dalbert, the Brazilian crossed for Chiesa, whose shot took a touch off Danilo to wrongfoot Łukas Skorupski. Even the ugly ones count, though, and Fede peeled off to celebrate.

Fede added a second after some nice work from the outstanding Lorenzo Venuti down the wing. Chiesa beat three Bologna defenders and fired at the goalkeeper, who parried the shot right back to him, and the Fiorentina 25 made no mistake with his second.

Nikola Milenković added the third (and his second in as many games) after an Erick Pulgar corner bounced around in the box a little bit, with Germán Pezzella flicking it on before the Mountain took a lovely little touch to set himself up and then hit an acrobatic volley past Skorupski to salt the game away.

[ed. note: can’t find video but will update when I can]

Fede finished his hat trick just before full time, latching onto a lovely pass from Christian Kouamé before cutting inside, hesitating, cutting further inside, and then unloading a flawless little curler that nestled just inside the far post. It was his first hat trick in Serie A and just his second as a professional.

Full time

Goals: Chiesa 48’ (ass. Dalbert) 54’ 89’ (ass. Kouamé), Milenković 74’ (ass. Pezzella)

Cards: Ghezzal 29’, Dalbert 81’; Corbo 80’

Change in the standings

Just like that, Fiorentina have climbed to 10th place with 46 points, even with Parma and Bologna (who drop to 12th) but leading on head-to-head results. Nice bit of work to swap spots with the Oscar Meyers and move into the top half.