On the surface Bologna and Fiorentina had two vastly different summers, especially in the transfer window. While Emiliano Viviano, Albin Ekdal and Miguel Britos capitalised on their impressive seasons and left Emilia-Romagna for new clubs, the highly-sought Viola trio of Riccardo Montolivo, Juan Manuel Vargas and Alberto Gilardino never made their own widely expected departures.
However two men who will be direct opponents this coming weekend did precisely the opposite. After a summer of inactivity in Florence, Sporting Director Panteleo Corvino concluded one of the transfer windows best deals when he secured the services of Italian international Mattia Cassani from Palermo. The full-back has been in stellar form over the past two seasons, controlling the entire right flank for the Rosanero and attracting attention from former club Juventus who made numerous attempts to bring the 28-year-old home to Turin.
Often looking more like a winger due to Palermo's playing style, Cassani is an extremely attack-minded player who loves to advance at every opportunity and to participate in attacks from the right flank. This is part of an amazing transformation of a player who's career began in central defence when he was part of Juve's highly successful youth teams under Gian Piero Gasperini.
In stark contrast, Bologna's Gastón Ramírez was expected to leave Bologna after some eye-catching displays that drew the attention of some of Europe's biggest clubs. Incredibly he stayed in Rosoblu and, despite still being only 20, will be called upon to provide much of the creativity for the much depleted Felsinei in the coming season.
"You’ll see that within two years, he will be on Alexis Sanchez’s level" - Bologna Sporting Director Carmine Longo on Ramirez
The Uruguayan, who narrowly missed out on selection to Oscar Tabárez' victorious Copa América squad, will face a tough test against Cassani and the two men match up extremely well. At 1.84m, Cassani is one centimeter taller and obviously vastly more experienced, having featured in 281 Serie A matches compared to just 25 for Ramirez. The Bologna man has a clear lead in the scoring stakes however, with his seven career goals compared to Cassani's two, while also receiving one less booking (six) than the former Palermo defender last term.
Due to their contrasting roles, Cassani clearly has a greater responsibility to stop opponents and this is reflected in their tackling, where he won 61 of the 81 challenges (75.3%) he contested last season. Interestingly Ramirez won a comparable 73.7%, but he only completed fourteen tackles to reach that total. Cassani is surprisingly the better passer of the two, not only registering a higher percentage (81.8% compared to 75.59%) but also in terms of volume, completing 1002 in total, an incredible 429 more than Ramirez.
Both men will be called upon to provide for their respective strikers, with Cassani notching four assists to just two for the Bologna winger last term. The Fiorentina man connected on an impressive 30.8% of crosses last term (Serie A's season average was 20.1%) while Ramirez managed just 18.6%.
Bologna's left-back will need the help of Ramirez if they are to shackle the attacking forays of Mattia Cassani, while the newest member of the Fiorentina ranks will hope to repeat their one previous encounter where he limited Ramirez to a single shot in Palermo's 4-1 demolition of Bologna back in February.
A typical youth versus experience battle that should be great to watch between two very different players and most definitely an intriguing battle in this encounter between two teams for whom last season ended in mid-table.
