When Tuscany Held it’s Breath

The final ten games of the season began like a storm rolling over the Tuscan hills – quietly at first, then with a force that threatened to derail everything S.S. Arezzo had built.

Two points clear at the top. Two points ahead of Ascoli.

Ten games from glory.

And yet, at the very moment when clarity was needed most, uncertainty struck.

Filippo Guccione (pictured)— the wiley veteran creator who lead the team with 9 assists, the lock-picker, the heartbeat between the lines — gone for the season with shin splints.

Shaka Mawuli Eklu, the enforcer who ranked 3rd in the division for tackles won per game (3.21), the midfield wall — gone too with a calf strain which would rule him out for the rest of the campaign. And as if the spine wasn’t already creaking, top scorer Mario Ravasio had departed for Sweden, leaving Pietro Cianci to step into a role he once owned but hadn’t fully claimed, with only an untested rookie as his back up.

The picture darkened.
But football rarely paints in straight lines.

Somewhere in those fading brushstrokes, hope still flickered — in the shape of a winger soon to return who hadn’t kicked a competitive ball in weeks.

Emiliano Pattarello.

The spark this team had been waiting for.

A Fragile Lead

The fragility of a team cobbled together, showed quickly.

A rivalry game against Perugia — tense, hostile, fierce — ended in defeat. The kind of loss that gnaws at the dressing room and drifts into the stands. Maybe this squad, battered and reshuffled, wasn’t built for the big stage. Maybe the dream was cracking under pressure.

Then Pontedera came, and with them, chaos.

0–2 down and sinking fast.
Pulling level.
Conceding again.
Responding again.

Twice.
A 4–4 scoreline that read more like a fever dream than a football match.

And then another rivalry clash — another loss — this time to Ternana.

This Arezzo team, who not long ago were looking nearly untouchable at the top of Serie C/B, hadn’t won for four games.

The media circled and supporters whispered.
Arezzo looked mentally spent, physically broken.

The team had only four fit midfielders. Tempo was being managed on the fly in games to preserve precious energy.

Youth team players were drafted into battles they weren’t meant for or ready for.

And yet… the miracle of a title race is that sometimes fate looks away.
Ascoli dropped points.
Arezzo remained top, two points clear.
Still standing.

Just.

The Return of the Catalyst

Softly at first, the storm seemed to be lifted. Beams of sunlight broke through and the Arezzo fans were given signs of hope.

Pattarello returned.

Not in full, glorious multi-colour – just in selective, careful minutes off the bench. Two substitute appearances against Carpi and Guidonia Montecelio.
Two assists leading to two winning goals.

The team felt different when he stepped on the pitch, replacing tired legs.
Brighter, sharper and braver.

Arezzo exhaled for the first time in weeks.

But the injury gods were not finished. Fettal — the backup striker, the tactical alternative brought in on loan from Real Madrid — strained a groin and vanished for three weeks. Then Cianci, the last senior striker standing, was ruled out for a crucial game against Pianese.

No strikers.
None.

With nerves around pushing Pattarello back too soon apparent, a winger — 18-year-old Samuele Sussi — was pushed into the fire as an emergency striker.

Arezzo roared ahead 3–0 through Tavernelli, Chierico and an own goal. But as tired legs lumbered on the the panic set in. Pianese pulled one back. 3–1.

Then another. 3–2.

The stadium trembling. Another 18-year-old, Lorenzo Lonini, thrown into defensive midfield for the final 20 minutes of a match that felt like a season swinging on a thread.

They held on against a barrage of pressure and shots.
Somehow.

And when the dust settled, the table told a story no one expected:

Arezzo — 10 points clear.

Ascoli has slipped up in back to back games.
Four games left and twelve points available.

And next up?
Second placed Ascoli.

The Day Tuscany Stood Still

The equation was simple: a draw meant the we’d hoist the Serie B/C trophy.

But nothing else about this season had been simple.

A bruised and depleted team.
Mentally drained.
Physically patched.

The match kicked off beneath a sky that felt heavier than usual, and falling rain battered the pitch.
Ascoli pressed from the first whistle and controlled the early phases of the game.

But Arezzo found their moment — Tavernelli, cold as marble, beat the offside trap and latched onto a pass from Chierico… striking the goal that tilted the title their way. 1-0.

The second half was siege warfare.
Ascoli throwing everything.
Arezzo refusing to break.

In the 66th minute, Ascoli got their rewards. A corner which wasn’t cleared properly saw the ball fall to the feet of Rizzo Pinna. The equaliser. 1-1

The onslaught continued. But the players hung on.

And when the final whistle cut through the tension…

S.S. AREZZO WERE CHAMPIONS.
Serie C/B champions.
Against every prediction.
Against every injury.
Against every moment the season tried to break them.

The final three matches became a victory lap of sorts.

Players rested.
Youngsters trusted and given an opportunity.

Samuele Sussi rewarded that faith with a hat-trick in a 6–2 demolition of Pineto.
Andriy Lysytskyi held his own at centre-back, showing a glimpse of a future that now stretched into higher divisions.

A 1–2 loss to Gubbio closed the season — a footnote on a campaign that would be remembered not for its ending, but for its defiance.

Tuscany Celebrates

When the team bus rolled through the streets of Arezzo and to the stadium that evening — open top, flags waving, songs echoing between old stone buildings — the city came alive.

Thousands lined the roads.
Not in Juventus numbers. Not Inter or AC Milan. Not Roma or Napoli.

But something better.

A crowd stitched together by pride, community, and the sense that this was their story.
Their club.
Their team rising again.

The players waved.
Staff laughed.
Flares lit the cobbled streets in amaranto smoke.

And then — almost hidden among the crowd — the boy from the first night, that open training session, stood again at the rail.

Same maroon-and-white scarf.
Same wide eyes.

The manager saw him.
And the boy saw him back.

A nod.
Just a small one.

But it meant everything.

A connection forged in the earliest days, now sealed in triumph.

As the staff and players celebrated around him, there was something different in the manager’s gaze.

A glint.
A flicker.
Not of joy — though joy was there — but of foresight.

He knew what came next.

Serie B.
A new level.
A harsher world.
A world where not everyone could follow.

Some players would leave — loyal, hardworking men who’d given everything but may not be built for the climb ahead.
Some staff too, despite their dedication.
Football is cruel, and progress even more so.

Tonight was for celebration.
Tomorrow would be for decisions.

But as confetti floated down and chants echoed across Tuscany, one thing was clear in the manager’s mind:

The journey has only just begun.

And Arezzo — this city, these colours, these people — was ready for the next chapter.