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The feeling at their home stadium was anything but joyful on Saturday afternoon. The home side was losing against Torino, a team that had allowed 10 goals while scoring only two in their last five league matches. Fans from the Curva Nord were finishing their ongoing dissent in an ongoing feud with president Claudio Lotito.

The Campaign Falling Apart?

Had their campaign coming unstitched, or did there exist a thread maintaining its structure from the beginning? The club brought back Maurizio Sarri as manager this summer, only for him to later acknowledge that the management had failed to disclose a ban on new signings they were facing for financial irregularities. Reports that he might quit were without basis, but he did say that Lotito had "misled" him.

The Biancocelesti appeared equally disorganized during matches as behind the scenes, beating Verona 4-0 and Genoa 3-0 but being defeated in the rest of their first five games, including the Rome derby. From one game to the next, observers have struggled to ascertain if they are improving or self-destructing.

Matteo's Unforeseen Return

At least one man kept smiling through it. Matteo Cancellieri had not been expected to feature for Lazio during this campaign. He completed last season at Parma as a loanee and, at the start of the off-season, Lazio were advocating for him to stay there temporarily. The transfer ban led to a change of plans. Lazio could not afford to thin their squad with no new signings.

Cancellieri arrived in the first place during Sarri's previous tenure, at that time a 20-year-old product of Verona's academy. He made 20 matches in the league with the club in 2022-23, all but one of those from the bench. The club's longtime sporting director, Igli Tare, whose tenure ended following that term, would later accuse Sarri of "informing all Cancellieri had superstar potential only to bench him consistently."

Finding His True Position

It's possible the coach was continuing to attempt to identify the specific characteristics of the player's talent. Originally described as a flank player upon signing, Cancellieri nevertheless spent most of that campaign as a struggling deputy to Ciro Immobile in the striker role. Across 63 games during spells with Empoli and Parma in the past two years, his tally was seven goals. Shoehorn