Genoa Club Amsterdam

The match Milan-Genoa is cancelled because of the death of 25 years old Piermario Morosini by a hartattack in the field during the match Pescara-Livorno. Genoa and Milan already had started their warming-up when the news about the death of the Livorno-player (Serie B) and the decision of the Italian Football Associciation to cancel all the matches of this weekend arrived.

The next match of Genoa now will be: Genoa-Siena on Sunday 22nd April at 15.00 hours. Genoa Club Amsterdam will be there for the first time since Genoa-Lazio on 5th February (last victory of Genoa!) to bring again 3 points to the team of Malesani. Because of the calcetto-tournament United in the name of Genoa on Saturday in Albaro 21 Dutch Rossoblu will arrive, a record for our fanclub!   

Till 15 minutes before the end everything was ok. Genoa was 1-0 ahead by a goal of Marco Rossi and Lecce was 1-0 down by a goal of Bergessio of Catania. In the last minutes everything changed: Mutu scored the equalizer in Luigi Ferraris just as Lecce on the island Sicily in the 88th minute. The goalkeeper of Catania protested against the goal of Lecce (offside ?!) and got his second yellow card, becaue Catania already substituted 3 times midfielder Lodi had to be the new keeper. In the 91st minute Di Michele also scored the winning goal to Lecce after a mistake of goalkeeper Lodi. In 15 minutes from 7 points ahead and almost save to now only 2 points ahead and the away-match in San Siro against Milan as next game. It will be a hard night for Malesani and the players.

Tomorrownight Genoa plays at 20.45 hours in Luigi Ferraris against number last in the standings Cesena. An easy match ? No, in Italy doesn’t exist easy matches as we could see in the first match against Ceseana that we lost by 2-0 (2 goals of Adrian Mutu). Genoa misses tomorrow Belluschi, Antonelli and Constant because of injuries and Kucka because of his 8th yellow card this season against Novara last Saturday. Let’s hope we finally can celebrate a victory after 5 draws and 5 defeats.

Mr. Malesani selected the following 20 players: Alhassan, Frey, Lupatelli, Mesto, Granqvist, Kaladze, Carvalho, Bovo, Moretti, Rossi, Veloso, Biondini, Birsa, Sturaro, Sculli, Jankovic, Jorquera, Palacio, Gilardino, Zè Eduardo

Again a draw while we alle hoped for the first victory since 5th February: Genoa-Lazio 3-2. Already in the 7th minute Genoa scored the openinggoal when Marco Rossi touched the shot of Rodrigo Palacio in the goal. During the first half both teams were equal, but after the break it seemed that Genoa was afraid to play. The equalizer of Mascara (ex-Genoa) halfway the 2nd half wasn’t a surprise. During the last part of the match Novara was the strongest team but our Rodrigo Palacio was the most close to a goal with a hard shot on the cross of the post and the crossbar. Because Lecce beat Roma by 4-2 we are now only 4 points above them. Wedsnesday-evening at 20.45 hours we play again: in Marassi against number last in the standings Cesena.

Two of our most fisical players Kucka and Granqvist are back in the team and ready to play Saturday at 15.00 hours in Novara. In the very important match against nr. 19 in the standings Genoa only has to miss Antonelli and Constant because of injuries and Belluschi because of his red card against Inter. Mr. Malesani can be happy to have so many experienced players back in the team. Tomorrow Genoa travels by coach to train already on the synthetic field of the hometeam from Piëmonte with 4 ex-Genoani: Gemiti (our Genoano of the year 2003/2004), Paci, Mascara and Caracciolo (hired to Novara).

This afternoon President Enrico Preziosi fired coach Pasquale Marino after 14 matches with only 13 points. The new coach till the end of the season is …… Alberto Malesani, our former coach that was fired a few days before Christmas after the 6-1 defeat in Napels. In the first half of the season Genoa had 21 points in 16 matches with Alberto Malesani, now in the last 8 matches we hope he can give us at least another everage of 1,30 points each match. The first match of Malesani is Saturday at the synthetic field of Novara.

Today it is exactly 20 years since Genoa-Ajax, the first meeting with Genoa. This birthday deserved a victory today, but also a 5-4 defeat against Inter is memorable. The love of Genoa started with the fans and the atmosphere in Luigi Ferraris, which still is the most important aspect in the relationship with Genoa. Below the article I wrote about the remarkable match 20 years ago in the semifinals of the Uefacup in the season 91-92.

 

The history of Genoa Club Amsterdam starts at thursday 5th March 1992 when I see on Dutch televison the Genoa-fans clapping their hands to welcome the Liverpool-supporters that come out of their coaches. The Dutch commentator tells me that everybody expected a war between the Italian and English fans because of the Heysel-disaster in 1985. Liverpool plays for the first time after Heysel in Italy and whole of Europe waits for a battle between the fans, but everybody was wrong, so totally wrong ..

At friday 20th March 1992 I hear that in the semi-finals of Uefa-cup my favorite team Ajax Amsterdam has to play against Genoa 1893, indeed the team with the fantastic supporters. My wife and I decide immediately to book the trip to Italy. We follwed Ajax for years in Europa and went to many matches outside Holland including the finals in Athens in 1987 (Ajax wins Cupwinners Cup against Lokomotive Leipzig by a goal of Marco van Basten) and Strassbourg in 1988 (Ajax loose the final of Cupwinners Cup against KV Mechelen) but this will be our first match in football-country Italy.

After a long trip by coach with lots of snow in Switzerland we reach Genova around 12 o’clock on Wednesday-morning, 6 hours before the match. The police leads our coach to the special sector for away-supporters and we have to stay around the stadium till the match begins, but we don’t care because the football-atmosphere is perfect. All of the city is coloured by the flags of Genoa (the most) and Sampdoria (less) and the people are, like we expected after seeing the welcome for Liverpool fans, very friendly. Two hours before the match it starts to rain, so we decide to enter the stadium.

After the check by the police the dream begins: a fantastic completely red and blue coloured English-style stadium with a big yellow bird in front of the opposite site of the stadium (now I know it’s the Griffin) and all the people are constantly singing and very enthusiastic. Of course we don’t understand a word of them, but for the first time in my life I agree with changing my scarve with a supporter of the other team. This is real football-fever ….

The match is fantastic and both teams want to attack, something which is surely not common in modern football. Ajax wins in the last minute and steals the victory and we all are waiting for a battle with Genoa-fans after the match because they lost such an important match at home in the last minute. But the battle never starts, people stay friendly and we do not keep an eye on the 50 Sampdoria-fans that are outside our sector to try to thank us for the victory. No thanks !

Two weeks later at the day of the return in Amsterdam, my wife that works in an office in city-centre calls me several times that there are constantly canal-boats with hundreds of enthusiastic singing Genoa-fans on the canal in front of here office. A fantastic view and she feels sorry that she does not have a fotocamera to make some pictures. Later that evening the match ends in 1-1 and Ajax goes to the final against Torino. The Genoa-dream is over, but already at that moment we are sure that we will never forget those crazy enthusiastic red and blue fans.

 

The most important result this afternoon: Lecce-Cesena 0-0. Unless the defeat of Genoa in Milano with 5-4 we are still 6 points ahead of Lecce and we now have 2 matches against the last 2 in the standings: Novara (Saturday 15.00 hours) and Cesena (Luigi Ferraris, 11th April 20.45 hours) in which we have to put Lecce on a bigger distance and save ourselves definitively in this crazy season.

Today after 45 minutes Genoa was 3-0 down by goals of Milito (2x) and Samuel. In the extra time of the first half referee Valeri refused to give us a penalty, but 1 minute later a bycicle kick of Sculli touched Moretti and the halftime score was 3-1. In the second half Palacio realized a penalty: 3-2, but when Zarate scored 4-2 everything seemed over. In the 80th minute Inter goalkeeper Julio Cesar fouled Palacio and got a red card of referee Valerie. Alberto Gilardino scored from the penaltypoint (4-3) and Genoa played with 11 against 10. This was the moment to referee Valeri to help the hometeam: Belluschi touched the ball in the arms of Frey, but Valeri whistled a penalty to Inter and gave Belluschi a red card. Diego Milito scored the penalty: 5-3, game over ? Not yet because on the other side Lucio fouled Sculli in the penaltyarea and the last penalty was (again) scored by Gilardino: 5-4. In the second half Genoa played a good match which gives us hope for the next weeks.

Again a spectacular match full of goals in Marassi. Genoa took the lead by a header (!) of Belluschi in the first half after a perfect cross of Mesto. A few times we were close to the second goal, but Italian international Montolivo scored the equalizer after a mistake of Marco Rossi. Halfway the second half Fiorentina scored their second goal by a header of Natali out of a corner. As many times this season it was Rodrigo Palacio with his fifteenth (!) goal who saved us for a defeat in the 89th minute. Because also Lecce draw we still have an advantage of 7 points to the 18th position in the standings.

Already in the third minute Osvaldo scored the only goal of the match. To be honest Roma deserved the 3 points unless the ball on the crossbar of Palacio 15 minutes before the end. It was the only time in the 2nd half that Genoa was close to the equalizer, while Roma was many times close to 2-0. Sunday we play in Luigi Feraris aginst Fiorentina that has 32 points, 1 less than us.

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