Pre-match

Both teams made a few changes, but Fiorentina made more as Vincenzo Italiano rotated the side after a poor showing against Bologna over the weekend. Things got even worse for him when Lucas Martínez Quarta pulled up with an injury during the warmups, pushing Sofyan Amrabat into defense and bringing Rolando Mandragora into the XI. Fatih Terim, who was in attendance at the stadium named in his honor, must have thought it was a long way from the side he used to coach.

First half

I cannot describe how dull it was. The Viola had twice as many fouls (8) as the teams had shots (2 apiece); Fiorentina put the only one on frame: a Riccardo Saponara curler that tamely nestled into Muhammed Şengezer’s gloves. Neither side demonstrated anything resembling intensity or desire.

Second half

Whoo boy. It looked about like the first half for awhile, but then Fiorentina conceded a really stupid corner (Başakşehir’s first) as Pierluigi Gollini allowed a backpass to run over the line and immediately conceded from it: Serdar Gürler reacted quickest to Youssouf Ndayishimye’s header and smashed a volley past Gollini, who rather let it go through him.

Did it get worse? Why yes, yes it did. The Viola never looked even remotely like threatening, even as they kept the ball and toothlessly knocked it around. Toothlessly, at least, until Lorenzo Venuti made a long, high backpass to Gollini again, and the Viola keeper made the inexplicable decision to juggle the ball outside his own area, allowing Gürler to charge him down and slot into the empty net. It may be the worst bit of goalkeeping I’ve seen this year. AndI watched the winner against Cremonese.

Jonathan Ikoné must have been as sick of watching as the rest of us, because he poked a toe into someone’s rib cage 5 minutes later for the most obvious second yellow card you’ve ever seen. In the dying moments, Luka Jović and Christian Kouamé at least tried to make it look respectable, but never got all that close. Nope, the goal came, of course, at the other end. Patryk Szysz latched onto a long pass, held it up, and played in Bertrand Traoré, whose low, first-time shot hit one of Gollini’s mitts but still squirmed into the net.

When the whistle finally went, it felt like a mercy. Holy smokes, man.

Full time

Goals: Gürler 57’ (ass. Ndayishimye) 71’

Cards: Ikoné 22’ 76’ (sent off), Amrabat 61’

What’s next

This was awful and the team needs to think very hard about what it wants to be at this point. There’s losing, and there’s getting humiliated. This fell firmly into the latter category, as . While Gollini will rightly shoulder a lot of the blame, the entire side was quite poor. While playing twice a week is tough and having half a dozen players absent through injury makes it worse, there’s no excuse for this kind of performance. I shudder to think of what Hellas Verona is going to do on Sunday against a side that plays like this.