The Parma Resurrection

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First league match for Parma in Lega Pro Girone B ends in draw

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Cannavaro's first league match in charge of Parma finished in a draw in a game that could have gone either way but where Parma should've probably done better considering the amount of shots they had on goal. Venezia took the lead and were actually leading at half-time but Parma struck back before going a goal down again and then coming back once again. Their fans probably expected a bit more from their team going into their first league game of the season but unfortunately a draw is all they'll be able to get. Next up for Parma is FeralpiSalò who started their campaign with a 3-0 win at home so it could be a tough match for Parma despite their home advantage but fans seem hopeful ahead of the clash.
 
love it mate, can't wait to see Cannavaro lift up the world cup with Italy!
 
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First league win for Cannavaro and Parma after dominant performance

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After a very dominant performance in what was supposed to be a tight game, Parma got their first 3 points of the season thanks to a Baraye goal early on in the game. Garufo also impressed in Parma's match which was enough to get him the man of the match as the Italian club led by Fabio Cannavaro climb up the table to now go right below the promotion places. For Parma fans, this game should be a good sign for the rest of the season considering they had a pretty rough start to their league campaign but this match seems to be getting Cannavaro's men back on their feet and ready to get a couple of wins on board in order to get the best chances of getting promoted to the Serie B next season. Can they do it? If they keep performing that way, we don't see why not!
 
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A look into Parma's last month and a half in Lega Pro Girone B

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It's now been almost 3 months since Fabio Cannavaro took over at Parma and so far, he's enjoyed a pretty good start to his career back in Italy. With 4 points from his first 2 games, he already looked like he was enjoying a good start but the last month and a half at the club has only been better.

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With 5 wins and one draw in his last 6 games, Parma has managed to grab 16 points from a possible 18 and 20 from a possible 24 all season. That is certainly a very good record and considering the Italian media wasn't expecting Parma to be a leader in the title race in the Italian third tier, Cannavaro has been doing exceptionally well.

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The table is also looking for the Serie A fallen giants as they already have the second best goal difference in the league and sit 3 points clear at the top ahead of Mantova. In terms of team statistics, Cannavaro's men are the most prolific attacking side of the campaign so far, with 18 goals scored in those 8 games but they have the 8th best defence in the league, which doesn't necessarily sound that great for a league leader. In addition, they have a pretty poor disciplinary record (11 yellows (11th in the league) and 1 red (2nd in the league)) which also adds a negative aspect to their game which Cannavaro will definitely have to work on as the season goes on. Down below we've put in a summary of each game that Parma has played in the last month or so along with some key comments taken from the post-match press conferences with manager Cannavaro.

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I think the majority of the game and the outcome of this game was really played in the midfield. I've already looked at a couple of the heat maps from this match and we were controlling the midfield and managing to distribute the ball well to our forwards, particularly on the left wing which cost them because I feel they were much weaker on that side of the pitch. In the end it was a pretty tight game but we got the win and I'm very happy with that.

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We were mostly attacking to the right side of the pitch and we definitely saw some improvements from last game, mostly the fact that we managed to get a clean sheet against a team who was really pressuring us in the midfield and allowed us a lot less of the ball than our last game about 4 days ago. In the end we did well and I'm happy about the performance and think that this is the start of a great run for the club.

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I think we got away with it today to be honest. Lately we've just not been good enough defensively. We've been conceding too many goals and it's making me a bit worried about our next few games because the opponent we faced today we did really well against about a month ago and now that we have a bit more fixtures we're getting sloppy and that's something we'll need to work on to make sure we don't concede so much. Even the heat map says it all, it shows that we had less of the ball and when we did have it, it was mostly in our half and we were just trying to ease the pressure by playing a bit higher up the pitch in order to prevent counter-attacks so hopefully in the next few games we'll improve on that.

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We took our time to get that goal (kind of) and had plenty of opportunities but also got a clean sheet so I think we did pretty well out there today. Was I worried we wouldn't win? No of course not. I'm very confident in my players' abilities and the fact that we had so many chances today showed that we were pretty much having a field day offensively and it showed why we're the best attacking team in the league this season so far. We've got quality players up front who can make things happen and now I can only hope that we keep this up and hopefully next game score even more goals and get as many chances to score them.

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Of course this was a frustrating game, last week I talked about how good we were offensively and today we just weren't there. Even defensively we were pretty poor. They had the ball in our half way too often and we allowed them to take way too many shots which in the end cost us 2 points. We've been doing well lately so I'm not too bothered by that but there were certainly some aspects of this game that I'll need to look at as we prepare our training sessions for the next week because there's a lot of work to be done still.

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This was the kind of game that makes us love football. Goals going in left right and centre and the lead going from one team to the other until the final whistle blows and there's just one team left as the winner. Luckily for us we were the winners of this game but it could've gone either away. I won't lie, when I arrived here at Parma, I thought we'd be by far the best team in the league but today Lumezzane proved me wrong and showed me that we're really going to have to work hard for our victories. Baraye? No I'm not worried about him. Every player has some periods in his career where he's inconsistent but he works really hard in training and some games it shows on the pitch, sometimes it doesn't. We're not a one-man team, we can handle having one player under-perform as we saw today. As long as the team wins, I don't care who performs and who doesn't.

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I'm excited about our next 3 games but we're facing 3 teams who are in the top half of the table and will definitely have the potential to surprise us if we're not careful, just like our last game. I'm definitely happy with the way things have gone and it's been a real eye-opener for me. Having managed in Saudi Arabia and China previously, coming back to Italy reminded me of how football is played here and how a lot of Italian teams pride themselves on defending, simply because of the fact that our country has had so many great defenders over the years. Speaking of defending, that's one thing that I know we need to improve on so in our next few matches, expect better performances on that front.

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As I said, we're a team with a lot of quality players and not a one-man team. Everyone is working hard for our wins and our current form and I'm very proud of every single player on the team so far, whether they've played one game or every single one, they've done a great job to get us top of the table after just under 10 games. Hopefully now we can keep fighting hard to try and get this Parma club back where it belongs!
 
The effort and level of detail you've put into this is fantastic mate. A really, really great read. I look forward to more.
 
Great story so far mate. I hope Fabio's Parma will be challenging the likes of Juve and Napoli soon enough!
 
Tobey Mason said:
Nice update buddy. You'll be back in Serie A soon enough
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1magine said:
The effort and level of detail you've put into this is fantastic mate. A really, really great read. I look forward to more.
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kolas79 said:
Looking very very good so far !
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Bullardinho said:
Great story so far mate. I hope Fabio's Parma will be challenging the likes of Juve and Napoli soon enough!
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Thanks so much guys, I didn't think I'd be getting this much support for this story, glad you're all enjoying it so far! :)
 
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First loss of the season for Parma after just over 10 league games

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Parma suffered their first defeat of the season about 2 weeks ago when they played against Ancona in the Lega Pro Girone B but have since then won 2 games in a row and find themselves in first place in the league as they keep pushing for promotion to the Serie B next season. With just one goal conceded in their last 3 games, Cannavaro will be very happy with the improvements of his defence and will definitely hope that those clean sheets and good defensive performances keep coming as the season keeps going along. Despite now becoming the 3rd best defence in the league, Parma have also become the third best attack in the league, falling 2 spots in 3 games which is probably something that Cannavaro will need to look into.
Parma's next 3 games in the league are once again against top half of the table opposition along with a cup tie against Livorno on the 16th of November so the Parma fans will really be hoping that their team can keep the good times going and perhaps make a good cup run to win their first trophy under new manager Fabio Cannavaro.

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Below we will now put some details about Parma's last 3 matches along with some key stats and quotes from manager Cannavaro:

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You know I think in the end we just didn't take our chances. It's tough to get our first loss of the season that way but it's the truth and we need to make sure that in the future we do a lot better because all of our shots (on the right side of the screen) were wide! At least almost all of them (with yellow arrows). It's just unfortunate because we've been really good at creating chances lately but just not good enough at finishing them.

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I think it was just another game where we let them have way too many shots and if you look at the average positions of the players throughout the game as well you'll see that they mostly stayed in the midfield so how did we concede so many shots? I don't know but what I do know is that we had so many chances and only scored one and that's not normal. Defensively, we've been better than as of late, I'm happy, but offensively is where we have a problem now and we're going to have to fix that if we want to come out as champions this season because it's not with performances like this that it's going to happen.

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We scored early and sat back, that's what I think of the game. Again, as a defender during my playing career, I'm not going to say there's anything wrong with that but I feel like lately we've just been focusing on defending and not really attacking and when we face teams that are much stronger than us, that'll become a big problem so hopefully we'll start thinking about our attack a bit more in our next few games. I have to say though, I'm not too worried because this has only been an issue for the best 3 games and not the whole season so I have confidence that my players will turn it around.

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I've definitely been looking at the table, of course. It's good to see that we're 3 points ahead but our goal difference is something that could let us down in my opinion. When I look at FeralpiSalò who are second, their goal difference is better than ours by 7 goals which is huge so we'll need to really improve ours in order to make sure that if it comes down to goal difference for the title or promotion or a play off spot, we beat that team right behind us.
 
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Parma on 6-match winning streak as they cruise at the top of Lega Pro Girone B

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Parma continue their strong start to their campaign with 4 wins in their last 4 league games along with an impressive win against Livorno in the Coppa Italia Lega Pro as well. Now 6 points clear at the top of the league almost halfway through the season, they're slowly starting to look like the favourites to not only get promoted but win the league title as well in what would be an incredible first season for Cannavaro back at the club he spent most of his career at. Below will be summaries of the games that Parma took part in in the last month along with a review from manager Cannavaro who had an exclusive interview with us to talk about his start here at Parma.

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"I'm very happy with my start here at Parma. I was expecting it to be a lot harder to be completely honest with you and the players have responded really well to the way I want them to play and the way that I want this team to be so that makes my job a lot easier for sure. They've given everything they have for every game and the fact is we've only lost one all season which goes to show how good we've been. Defensively we're not there yet you know but that'll come, just like offensively at first we weren't there but having worked on that in training we got better and are now the best attack in the league. Our next month is going to be really packed with a lot of fixtures including a cup game so it's going to be tough keeping this form up but I'm confident in my players and my staff and definitely believe we can keep the good times going here."

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