The Italian Managerial Carousel Spins On (Really, Really Fast)

By: Martha | December 19th, 2007

Poor, poor Nedo. Through 16 weeks of the Serie A season, six teams (that’s 30% of the league) have fired their coaches, and one of them has already gotten rid of two. No matter what league you follow, those are some impressive damn numbers. Every single team in the bottom five — Siena, Livorno, Empoli, Reggina and Cagliari — have hit reset button and brought in someone new to fix things, as have Palermo who, when the sacking took place, were lurking around a UEFA Cup spot, albeit in an unimpressive way.

To make things even more mad, two of those teams have rehired a manger they fired months or, in the case of Cagliari, just weeks before. Palermo dismissed bright young thing Stefano Colantuono late last month, only to replace him with Francesco Guidolin (who, you may recall, was taking the job for the third time in less than a year).

Then, today, Cagliari (who are bottom of the table and really, really in trouble for more reasons than just their 10 points) responded to the departure of coach Nedo Sonetti — himself hired just a month ago — by trying to bring back Marco Giampaolo, the very man they’d dismissed in favor of Sonetti last month. Oh, and that’s not even the end of it! Giampaolo went through exactly the same freaking thing with Cagliari last year, being fired early in the season and then rehired to keep the team up, a task at which he obvious succeeded, since they’re fighting the drop again now. Just to complicate matters further, though, Giampaolo is ignoring the news on the Cagliari website that he’s been recalled, and is instead digging in his heels and talking about crazy things like “dignity” and “honor.” (God knows what’s gotten into him.)

No matter what happens with Giampaolo, the seven dismissals through 16 weeks is a Serie A record, and has to be close to the most impressive run for the first four months of any major league — can anyone think of any other contenders?