Udinese coach Francesco Guidolin has come under fire this season, with the veteran having led his team to a lowly 14th place with just 11 rounds remaining. With the zebrette having qualified for Europe in each of the last four seasons, a potential sacking may seem understandable. In reality, replacing him is the most dangerous thing the team could do.
Francesco Guidolin is invaluable for Udinese
Udinese are having a tough season, but pinning the blame on their coach could have serious consequences.
Gabriele Maltinti
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Tucked up in the northeast corner of Italy, Udinese is an unusual club. They’re unashamedly -- in fact, quite proudly -- a “selling club,” with their transfer strategy invariably involving scouting and signing young talent from all corners of the earth, giving it a stage to impress in Serie A and then selling that talent for a big profit.
The strategy has proven remarkably effective, with Udinese not only reaching Europe regularly but also raking in an impressive profit. According to figures just published in La Gazzetta dello Sport, Udinese's profit was €32.3 million last season, which is more than any other team in the league. When considering that only six teams in Serie A actually made money, Udinese accomplished no mean feat. They are far from the biggest club in Italy, but their policy has seen them buck the trend of financial problems and compete with the traditional giants.
It's possible to put together an XI of players who've come and gone at Udinese over the last few seasons which would run Juventus pretty close for a scudetto. Samir Handanovič, Mehdi Benatia, Pablo Armero, Gökhan Inler, Kwadwo Asamoah, Juan Cuadrado and Alexis Sánchez would all almost certainly feature.
The downside of Udinese's policy is that sometimes their scouts are going to pick up players who aren't quite good enough to challenge for Europe -- or at least not yet. That seems to be the case so far this season, though that doesn't mean we should write off the current crop. In a 1-0 defeat away at Parma in January, Guidolin fielded a team with an average age under 23 -- the youngest any Serie A side has fielded so far this season.
Only the goalkeeper, Željko Brkić (27) and two of the starting centre-backs, Danilo (29) and Thomas Heurtaux (25), were over 23 years old. Now that 17-year-old Italian Simone Scuffet has become a regular between the sticks, that average age could have been even lower. Udinese certainly have the potential to bounce back with a European charge next season.
Some of these players will move on, but a blessing of this bad season is that interest may well have been reduced.
Wing-back Gabriel Silva has been at the club for a couple of years, but only this season has the 22-year-old broken into the first team, and he's been arguably the zebrette's best player. In midfield, teenage playmaker Bruno Fernandes arrived from Novara in Serie B, and while he's still very raw, he's not short of potential.
In attack, 23-year-old Argentine Roberto Pereyra has piqued the interest of some of Serie A's best clubs with his intricate offensive play, and while striker Luis Muriel -- one year Pereyra's junior -- hasn't enjoyed a great season, he has already shown his potential, scoring 11 goals in 22 Serie A appearances last season. Some of these players will move on, but a blessing of this bad season is that interest may well have been reduced.
Udinese are a constant work in progress: new players scouted, coached, signed and sold, with Guidolin tasked to bring the remaining squad together cohesively in his classic counter-attacking style. It’s a much harder task than at a club where turnover of the playing personnel is low, and players have time to become accustomed to the tactics of the coach and, more importantly, the pace of the league.
Save for this disappointing campaign, the 58-year-old has proven himself to be perfect for the task, and has already begun moulding the zebrette's next team. Their 1-0 win over AC Milan on the weekend is hopefully a sign of things to come, with the winning goal a glorious flowing move: the ball passed quickly, directly and accurately, and culminated in an easy finish for who else but Udinese's only constant, 36-year-old striker Antonio Di Natale.
Ultimately, the three points don’t count for a great deal. But Udinese looked like a classic Guidolin team once again, and that counts for everything. What he manages to achieve makes him wildly more valuable than any of the transient players, and a rash firing could backfire with serious consequences.
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