Season starts with Mantova and Catania

Rafaelle Palladino shows us the way: straight forwards

In a few days you will find the complete competition-schedule on this internetsite. The season starts with the match Genoa-Mantova in Coppa Italia on Saturday 23rd or Sunday 24th Augutus. One week later Serie A starts with the match Catania-Genoa. The 7th of September there is no Serie A because of a qualification match of Italy to South-Africa 2010. The week after on Sunday 14th September Genoa plays the first homematch in Serie A against A.C. Milan (with Ronaldinho, but without Marco Borriello who is operated yesterday in Belgium by famous doctor Martens).

The derbies against Sampdoria take place on 7th December (away) and 3rd May (home), probably 2 weeks before the 2nd calcetto-edition United in the name of Genoa. 

Domingo arrived; Greek battle with Ajax about defender Sokratis Papastathopoulos

Nicolas Domingo, 23 years old Argentinian midfielder Sokratis Papastathopoules, 22 years old Greek defender

Today Genoa presented the 13th new arrival this summer: talented midfielder Nicolas Domingo. The little 23 years old Argentinian player (1.74) played with River Plate. It looks like Genoa finally has found a subsitute of defender Cesare Bovo who returned to Palermo. In the battle with Ajax, that offered € 3,5 million to AEK Athens, the rumours say that Genoa did the best offer with € 4 million, so the very talented central defender Sokratis Papastathopoulos will wear the Rossoblu shirt in a few days. Will be continued ….

Today Genoa played the second friendly match against the Italian Serie C-2 team: AC Rodengo Saiano. The Gasperini-boys scored 4 times: Sculli and Olivera (twice) before halftime and Palladino after the break. Rubinho and Scarpi stayed unbeaten, so Genoa won by 4-0. The next friendly match is Friday 1st August against AEK Athens, the (ex?) team of Papastathopoulos.

Ruben Olivera, 25 tears old striker (foto: thanks Genoa CFC)

Genoa scores a lot against Stubaital: 18-1

the first Genoa line-up of the season 2008-2009

Yesterday Genoa played the first friendly match of the season in Neustifst (Austria) against the hometeam Stubaital. The Grifoni scored 18 times, 7 in the first and 11 in the second half. The last goal of the match was, as a matter of friendship, scored by Stubaital in the 90th minute. Topscorer of Genoa was Olivera with 4 goals, Di Vaio (3), Di Gennaro (2), Greco (2), Pinau (2) and Palladino, Biava, Mesto, Rossi and Sculli all 1 goal. Genoa missed the injured Figueroa and Paro.

Last week Genoa sold Leon and Lucarelli to Parma in Serie B, while the transfer of Olivera to Genoa now is official. 

Olivera + ? make Genoa ready for next season

Ruben Olivera at the right after a goal with Juventus

Tonight both father Enrico Preziosi and son Fabrizio Preziosi spoke in an interview about the situation with Genoa, 1 week before the first training at 16th July in Liguria. Both confirmed that another 2 new players will arrive: a stand in to central forward Lucho Figueroa which will be 99% sure the Uruguayan player Ruben Olivera. The old player of Juventus and Sampdoria is 25 years old and 1.82 meters high. He arrived from Uruguay in Italy at the age of 19 in the Juventus Primavera team of Mr. Gasperini who still believes in the capacities and mentality of the international player (22 matches with Uruguay’s national team) who had some bad periods the last years. 

The other new arrival certainly is a big and experienced central defender. 2 players are favorite: Maurizo Domizzi of Napoli and Dario Dainelli of Fiorentina. Will be continued..

Tropheo Spagnolo: Genoa – AZ Alkmaar

At Wednesday 13th August in the yearly match to remember the killed Genoa-supporter Vincenzo Claudio Spagnolo the team of Mr. Gasperini plays against the Dutch team AZ Alkmaar. The team of the Cheese-city 40 kilometers Northwest of Amsterdam is in the hands of the famous ex-coach of Ajax and Barcelona: Louis van Gaal.

Louis van Gaal during the winning Champions League final against Milan (Vienna 1995) 

Also the 2 assistent coaches were succesful with Ajax in the 90’s: Patrick Kluivert (only goalscorer in the Champions League final against Milan in 1995, 4 months after the killing of Spagnolo) and Shota Arveladze. AZ Alkmaar has a very young talented team that was close to the Dutch title in the years 2005-2006 + 2006-2007. Last year the club was not so succesful with the 11th position in the standings. The team always tries to play attractive and offensive football and has 3 famous players: Demy de Zeeuw (Dutch international), Graziano Pellè and Moussa Dembélé.

Steve Pinau, Genoa beats Monaco + Man. City

Steve Pinau, 20 years old French striker

Unless the fact he played only 14 minutes in the first team of A.S. Monaco we can say that Genoa bought a very talented striker. Thanks to Federico Pastorello, son of the technical director of Genoa, our Rossoblu club surprised A.S. Monaco and Manchester City that both wanted to offer a contract to the 20 years old youngster. With the Monagask team Pinau only had an ending youth contract, which means that Pinau arrives without a transfersum in Genova. A.S. Monaco is not happy with the clash of Genoa and annulated the arranged friendly match that should take place next month.

Palladino signs contract; 3 Olympic Genoani

Raffaele Palladino at Genoa’s headquarters (grazie sito Genoa CFC)

Today was finally the presentation of our biggest transfer so far this summer: Raffaele Palladino signed his 4 years contract with Genoa. The very talented wing-striker is now 50% owned by both Genoa and Juventus. The 24 years old player was raised in the youth of Juventus in the hands of Mr. Gasperini. Despite his 24 years he already played 48 matches in Serie A (26 with Juventus, 22 with Livorno) and 64 in Serie B (25 with Juventus, 39 with Salernitana). Till now Raffaele scored 4 times in Serie A and 23 goals in B. 

Also today new arrival Abdelkader Ghezzal was sold to Siena within the deal that also brought Manuel Coppola to Siena (Thanks for all Coppolino, our Genoano of the year 2005-2006) and did return the complete ownership of 19 years old toptalent Fernando Forestieri to Genoa. Forestieri will be hired to Siena next season.

The coach of the Italian Olympic team Casiraghi today published his list with the 22 players that play in the Azzuro shirt at the Olympics. On the list are the 2 talented defenders of Genoa: Salvatore Bocchetti and Domenico Criscito. It is almost sure that Anthony Vanden Borre also will be convocated in the Olympic team of Belgium, which means that 3 Genoani are present in China at the Olympic games.

Who is the new leader of our defence ?

Maurizo Domizzi (Napoli)  Dario Dainelli (Fiorentina)  Marco Rossi (Parma)

After our central-defenders Bovo (Palermo) and De Rosa (end of contract) left Genoa, Mr. Gasperini and his staff are searching to find 2 substitutes. Youngster Bocchetti is the first arrival, so the second one should be more experienced.

The first candidate is Maurizo Domizzi, the central-defender of Napoli who wants to return to the North of Italy because of his family. Untill now Napoli asks too much money, but today the old team of Maradona went without Maurizio to the trainingscamp in Austria. Maybe this is a sign that the transfer is nearby.

The second candidate is Dario Dainelli, the tall and experienced captain of Fiorentina. This year Fiorentina wants to make the step to the top of Europe and they think they need a new central defender with more international experience. At the moment Fiorentina contracted their international player they sell Dainelli. 

The last option is Marco Rossi, indeed the player with the same name as our captain. The young defender plays with Parma that relegated to Serie B last season and the youth-international wants to stay in Serie A. Maybe Marco Rossi can be changed with Leon because our forward is very popular with Parma.