Serse Cosmi has infused new aspirations in Lecce. The Serie A strugglers surprised the pundits on Sunday after halting Inter’s winning streak with a shock 1-0 win at their Via del Mare stadium.
By the end of the first round, Lecce seemed down and out, having only managed 13 points and well below the pre-set target of 20 at the half-way stage of the season.
Before beating Inter, Lecce’s only positive results at their own backyard had come at the expense of fellow strugglers Novara (1-1 on the 10th day) and Chievo (2-2 on the 19th day).
The writing was on the wall... Lecce’s chances to prolong their stay in the top flight looked slim. But in comes Cosmi and Lecce soon start to fire on all cylinders.
Cosmi took over from Eusebio Di Francesco at the start of December. Up to that stage, Lecce had only two wins and two draws to show in the standings.
Things did not improve much at first as Lecce only managed one win (1-0 vs Fiorentina) and two draws (3-3 vs Parma and 2-2 vs Chievo) in their next six outings. That in-consistent patch also included a 4-1 hammering at the hands of Inter on December 21.
But on Sunday afternoon Cosmi was oozing confidence.
He told reporters in his after-match comments that Lecce were up to the challenge and determined to beat the drop.
Cosmi had grabbed the head-lines when making his debut in the Serie A.
In 2000, Luciano Gaucci surprisingly appointed the then unknown Cosmi at the helm of Perugia. Before, he had only coached Arezzo in the lower divisions.
But at Perugia Cosmi did really well and launched the career of future star players, the likes of Marco Materazzi, Hidetoshi Nakata, Fabrizio Miccoli, Fabio Grosso and Fabio Liverani.
Perugia, however, went down in 2004 and Cosmi left for Genoa who were also in Serie B that year.
He helped his new team win promotion but that summer the club was found guilty of match-fixing and Genoa were eventually relegated to Serie C1.
Cosmi was then linked with the vacant job at Roma but the deal fell through so he tried to bounce back by taking over from Luciano Spalletti at Udinese.
Cosmi helped the team qualify for the Champions League and the side was off to a promising start to their 2005/06 campaign.
However, after a barren run, Cosmi was shown the back door. He was replaced by veteran Giovanni Galeone.
Cosmi failed to lead Brescia back to the top division in the two years that followed and in 2009/10 he replaced Gennaro Ruotolo at modest Livorno but failed in his mission to keep them in Serie A.
Last year, Cosmi was in charge at Palermo but only for four games.
The Sicilians’ remarkable 1-0 win over Milan was Cosmi’s only moment of triumph at Palermo as Maurizio Zamparini gave him the sack and re-appointed Delio Rossi.
At Lecce, Cosmi seems to have found the environs to his liking.
But he knows that combative qualities alone will not win you titles and Lecce have to struggle to avoid the bottom three places.
The situation is slightly better now and Lecce are only three points adrift of fourth-from-bottom Siena following their victory over Inter.
Tonight, Lecce travel to one of Cosmi’s former clubs, Udinese.
This will be another difficult test for the southerners but they desperately need to keep winning points to maintain their confidence levels high.
Failure to do so, would imply that Sunday’s victory over Inter was just an isolated moment of hurrah for them... and Cosmi in particular.
Serie A statistics
1st home win for Fiorentina since beating Roma 3-0 on the 14th day as the Viola edged neighbours Siena by the odd goal in three at lunchtime on Sunday. The upset was Siena’s fifth straight defeat on the road. Siena, Novara and Palermo are still in search of their first away success.
5 points collected by Parma in three games under new coach Roberto Donadoni. On Saturday, they came from a goal down to share the spoils with Catania for the first time in four years. This was Catania’s first positive result after back-to-back defeats to Bologna (0-2) and Udinese (1-2).
5th straight win for Lazio at Chievo’s Bentegodi sta-dium as on Sunday Edy Reja’s Skyblues also recorded their first away success since beating Lecce 3-2 on the 15th day. Chievo’s only home win in 10 encounters with Lazio dates back to January 2002 (3-1).
8th win for Juventus in their last 10 home meetings with Udinese as the leaders condemned the north-easterners to their fourth away setback this season. Juve and Udinese have last shared the spoils in March 1990 (1-1). Udinese’s latest of two away wins came at Inter (1-0) on Day 14.
25 goals were scored on the 20th day as foreign players contributed with 14 goals. Total number of goals scored so far is 498. Juve have the best defensive record with 13 goals against. Juve and Udinese are still undefeated at home and Palermo are yet to figure in a home draw. Zlatan Ibrahimovic (Milan) is the leading marksman with 15 goals.