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The mood at Lazio's home ground was decidedly gloomy on Saturday afternoon. The home side was losing against Torino, an opponent that had conceded a total of 10 goals while scoring only two in their last five league matches. Supporters from the Curva Nord were wrapping up their most recent demonstration in an ongoing feud with president Claudio Lotito.

The Campaign Coming Unstitched?

Was Lazio's season falling apart, or did there exist a binding element holding it together from the beginning? They reappointed Maurizio Sarri to lead the team during the off-season, before he admitted that the board had omitted to inform him about a registration embargo they were facing for accounting issues. Rumours that his departure was imminent were not true, but he acknowledged that Lotito had "misled" him.

Lazio appeared equally disorganized on the pitch as they were off it, overcoming Verona 4-0 and Genoa 3-0 but being defeated in the rest of their first five games, including the Rome derby. At any given moment, observers have struggled to tell if they are improving or imploding.

The Youngster's Surprising Presence

A single player remained positive amid the chaos. Matteo Cancellieri was not even supposed to feature for Lazio during this campaign. He completed the last one on loan at Parma and, at the start of the off-season, his parent club were advocating for him to extend his stay a while longer. The signing restriction led to a change of plans. The club couldn't risk to weaken their team with no new signings.

He signed in the first place during Sarri's previous tenure, back then just 20 years old graduate of Verona's academy. He made 20 matches in the league for Lazio in 2022-23, all but one of those coming off the bench. The ex- sporting director, Igli Tare, who left following that term, later stated Sarri of "promising everyone Cancellieri would be a star but then not selecting him."

Discovering His True Position

Maybe Sarri was persistently working to work out the nature of his skill set. Originally described as an attacking winger upon signing, Cancellieri instead found himself the majority of that term as an ineffective backup to Ciro Immobile in the striker role. Across 63 games on loan at Empoli and Parma in the past two years, he netted seven goals. Shoehorn