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After Palermo's embarrassing 7-0 loss to Udinese, there were strong grumblings that manager Delio Rossi would be fired on Monday morning. Chairman Maurizio Zamparini made plenty of public comments about his displeasure with the team's recent performances, so after a 7-0 loss, today's announcement was a mere formality. According to the club's official website, Rossi has been relieved of his duties and has already been replaced by Serse Cosmi.
Cosmi was most recently the manager of Livorno, before which he managed Genoa and Udinese. He got Genoa promoted to Serie A from Serie B before managing Udinese, where he inherited a team who had qualified for the UEFA Champions League. However, less than satisfactory results led to him being fired. He then had stints at Brescia and Livorno, the latter of which employed him into 2010.
For those who fell in love with Palermo's exciting, though often unsuccessful and erratic style of football, fear not. While Delio Rossi is gone, and his two trequarista system might be going with him, Serse Cosmi is not a boring man.
The rumors that Delio Rossi, manager at Palermo, have been swirling for a few weeks now. To call his relationship with club president Maurizio Zamparini "strained" or "contentious" would be an understatement: Zamparini regularly points his finger at Rossi in public, blaming the coach for any of the team's failings. Still, fans wrote a letter of support for Rossi, and captain Fabrizio Miccoli made public the player's backing of their coach. But after Palermo lost 7-0 at home to Udinese -- in a battle being dubbed as an audition for the Champions League spots, no less -- it's hard to imagine that Rossi thought his job to be safe.
Although Rossi refused to resign, it appears almost certain he's on his way out: "Rossi has a 1% chance of staying. He has ruined my Palermo," said Zamparini. "He has destroyed this team. I told the coach to sort out the defence and he didn't. Rossi dropped Ezequiel Muñoz and he is the best in defence. You can't play like that."
While Zamparini's assertion that Palermo's defense is the worst in the league might be a bit of an overstatement -- Bari have a worse goal difference, after all, and Lecce have conceded more goals -- being included with the clubs in the relegation zone is rarely a sign of strength for a team with Champions League ambitions.
Serse Cosmi, last seen at Livorno, and the one you want to call if you need an extra baseball cap, and Giuseppe Papadopulo, who likes to get around but was most recently at Bologna, have both declared interest in the job. Zamparini has said he is meeting with three candidates between Monday and Tuesday.
Serse Cosmi Out, Delio Rossi In At Palermo
Troubled Palermo have spun the managerial merry-go-round once more, firing Serse Cosmi following their 4-0 defeat at the hands of Catania and somehow ending up back where they started with Delio Rossi, who had himself been given the boot from the Rosanero after a 7-0 home defeat at the hands of Udinese less than two months prior to being reinstated. Although Palermo's worrying patch of form, which has seen them go from Champions League contenders to 8th place, began under Rossi, Cosmi did little to arrest the slide with three points out of a possible twelve (although his sole win was against leaders AC Milan), and that wasn't good enough for the club's notoriously fickle leadership.
Cosmi, as one might imagine, is not best pleased with this turn of events, as quoted in Gazzetta dello Sport:
If the team stays true to form, Cosmi doesn't have to worry about being unemployed for long - he'll be back with Palermo by the end of the season.
Apr 04 1:08p by Graham MacAree - 0 comments