On the good foot.

By: salvatore | August 24th, 2008

Lazio kicked off this season’s Coppa Italia campaign with a 5-1 drubbing of Benevento yesterday (a scoreline predicted by Cathal, btw). Beating a Serie C team is nothing to crow about, so we won’t celebrate too much, but there is something to be said about starting the season off on the good foot…especially since the team has looked confident and organized in four straight games, including the losses in England and Portugal.

So far so good then (particularly since Palermo, Chievo and Lecce were all eliminated yesterday by teams playing in lower level divisions).

The biancoceleste got on the board early, with a Benevento mistake leading to the first goal in the ninth minute. Meghni doubled the lead about ten minutes later before Bueno scored a consolation goal for the Campania-based C1 side. Manfredini and a double from Pandev closed out the game, but there was never really any doubt. Aside from some defensive hiccups and Makinwa’s usual underwhelming play, the team was solid, with Goran, Matuzalem and even Mauri (!) all seemingly ready for the season to start.

If there were any negatives, it’s the fact that both Meghni and De Silvestri picked up injuries. Mourad has some trouble with his knee, while Lorenzo pulled out with a muscular problem. Neither are expected to be out too long, but this is the last thing you want to read about, especially since we’re coming of a year of ridiculous injuries.

Also worrying is the fact that the aforementioned Makinwa continues to get playing time over Zarate. I won’t pretend to know more about football than Delio Rossi, but good god in heaven, it has to be clear by now that Stephen is just not cut out for Serie A. That’s not to say that Zarate is going to be a guaranteed success in the top flight, but at least with him you can see the class and talent. Makinwa…not so much. The last market week is bound to bring some changes, but if it doesn’t, I’d like to see more of the Zarate kid please.

The next opponent on the Coppa Italia trail will now be Atalanta...Forza Lazio.

Here are a few pics from yesterday’s game. You can see more here: