***
Roma 1 (1) - Slovan 0 (1)
PDO, geisha bun and all, is in the house. So too is TDB. This whole nickname thing is getting easier, if a bit cheap. Lamela and Greco looking like they're preparing to buy notebooks and pencils for school. And PDO seems begging for a Scooby Doo nickname or something.
Official:
Better. However, if they start the Serie A season like this, drastic measures may need be taken.
ROMA (4-3-3): Stekelenburg; Cicinho, Cassetti, Burdisso, José Angel; Viviani, Perrotta, Simplicio; Bojan, Totti, Caprari.
A disp.: Lobont, Heinze, Rosi, Taddei, Brighi, Okaka, Verre.
***
And let the magical bong hits of Pablo Daniel Osvaldo lead the way.
I have the sudden urge to celebrate his signing by spreading chunky peanut butter on corn chips.
Several things are going to happen today:
i. Lots of words on P.D.O., how screwed Roma got in the course of buying him - they didn't just overpay, they got fucking hosed - and how his Serie A track record - 16 goals in 3.5 years as a striker is...abysmal? Abysmal. - gives me chest pains, and yet...acknowledging that someday, I'm really going to like him.
It's a laundry thing.
(I'm less interested in how he did playing for Espanyol/in La Liga. Apples and fucking mangoes.)
ii. The simple fact that 18 months ago he wasn't good enough for Bologna, yet Roma has suddenly spent beacuoup millions on him makes me want to cry into my Cheerios.
iii. How the last week - the Osvaldo signing and Luis Enrique's utter stupidity regarding Slovan/Borriello - has torpedoed my faith in this new project. There are growing pains as a coach. Thinking BoCaKa is somehow the means to something magical is something else entirely, particularly when there are a couple of guys named Totti and Borriello on the bench, and then subsequently and knowingly torpedoing the value of the latter when he's for sale? Come on.
iv. How excited I am for the outgoing soundbites in which Marco Borriello refers to Roma with all sorts of expletives and possibly making a "sinking ship" reference.
v. Let's get this out in the open: The "if Caprari had buried that sitter from the first leg...." argument.
Why the fuck was he on the pitch in the first place?
Why wasn't, oh I don't know, someone like Francesco Totti burying that ball and sucking his thumb in celebration? Unlike Caprari, who was sucking his thumb as a coping mechanism.
vi. How all of this simply means it's Roma per usual. Putting the 'fun' in 'dysfunctional'.
I'm a realistic person tending towards (ahem, extreme) optimism when it comes to Roma.
This year is going to be really, really fucking long.
Buckle up, bottoms up.
Random, unprovoked query: do they drug test at these "medicals"?
XI
Exclusives are rare here, as no one seems to care much about me, but I did get EXCLUSIVE (!) word of Luis Enrique's starting lineup on the evening:
