One down…

By: salvatore | May 26th, 2008

Well, if seeing is believing, you should cast your eyes on the pic below. In it you’ll find Juan Pablo Carrizo in the middle of his Lazio medical.

Barring some sort of last minute health issue, this should be finalized in the next little while. As far as I can tell, the only reason it hasn’t been made official yet is because the team is waiting for Ledesma’s non-Eu spot to open up (he’s in the process of obtaining European citizenship). At least that’s what I’m guessing.

In any case, Carrizo’s fee has been paid, and he’s been tested by the medical staff. For all intents and purposes, he’s a Lazio player, and the Biancoceleste finally have a solid keeper. I made it a point to check up on him regularly this year, and he just seemed to be improving with every game, until he became a dominant presence in the Argentine league, and was damn near fellated by the Argie press in the process. If his performances in South America are anything to go by, Lazio may have snatched a huge player for the future.

In a weird way then, we can be thankful for the extra year at River Plate. Yeah, we probably lost anywhere from 6 to 10 points this year because of gaffes from Ballota and Muslera, but who knows how important that extra year of development and experience might end up being for Carrizo?

So, unless something truly awful happens (always possible), the off-season’s first pressing need (getting a keeper that isn’t a grandfather) has been taken care of.

Next up? Hard to say with Lotito, but you’d imagine that the loan situations of Bianchi and Rozehnal will be sorted out before anyone else is brought in. For a while there, it looked like Rolando was going to be here to stay, and the Czech international would be sent packing…now, not so much. In fact, their futures seemed to have been exchanged.

In Rozehnal’s case, he might have just played his way into the team’s plans. For some reason, he wasn’t given much space to show what he could do until the last four games of the year. When he got it though, he fit right in at the center back position, and provided the strength and assuredness Siviglia and Cribari lacked all year. I’d like him to get a shot at the position for next year.

As for Bianchi, it’s probably just a matter of dollars and cents. Let’s face it, he’s a good striker, but anyone that has seen him play can understand he is not worth the 12 million Euros that Man City paid for him (and are now asking in return). Lotito has come to his senses on the subject too, and it seems that unless Rolando’s fee is lowered, he’ll be sent back to City and their fugitive Thai president.

Transfer rumors over the last couple of days have centered on a possible replacement for Bianchi, with Fiorentina’s Pazzini and Palermo’s Cavani being mentioned. I’d personally prefer the latter, if only because I have a hard time believing the former would want to give up on CL experience to join the Aquiloti, but what the hell, stranger things have happened.

Oh, and there’s also the little tidbit of Juve trying to offload Giovinco to Lazio last year, only for our genius president to refuse. Why, you ask? Because the über-talented future phenomenon, is “too small“.

Sigh.