Fiorentina Struggling on and off the Pitch in Nightmare Season
The 2025/26 season has been a very tough season to be a Fiorentina fan. The club is in the mist of a relegation battle and are looking over there shoulder in the prospect of potentially playing in Serie B, and off the field, the club is dealing with more heartbreak after the death of owner and president Rocco Commisso who sadly passed away on January 16th 2026. This comes just over 22 months since Joe Barone the CEO of Fiorentina passed away in San Raffaele Hospital a day before his 48th birthday on March 19th, 2024.
With 14 matches left, La Viola find themselves just three points off the bottom of the Serie A table and three away from safety, and last Saturday evening at home to Torino — who are just four places and nine points better off — played out a 2-2 draw in Florence.
Once again Fiorentina found themselves dropping more points from winning situations. Going 2-1 ahead into stoppage time, Fiorentina conceded from a set piece headed home by Guillermo Maripán unmarked into the far corner. Queue the frustrated boos and whistles from the frustrated home fans who find themselves in dire trouble.
After the last three years of consistency, first under Vincenzo Italiano and the sole season under Raffaele Palladino, the story of the 2025/26 season tells a different story. In Palladino’s sole season, Fiorentina finished sixth and managed to get a Europa League Conference spot with a dramatic 3-2 win over Udinese, while Lazio threw it all away and lost 1-0 at home to Lecce.
Things started to unravel and just three days later Palladino walked away and resigned from La Viola. The last three seasons they have finished eighth, sixth and sixth, qualifying for the UEFA Conference League on all three occasions and finishing runners up twice in 2023 — losing to West Ham United and 2024 to Olympiacos in Athens. Last season, Fiorentina were knocked out in the semi finals by Real Betis.
In the summer of 2025, Stefano Pioli, who last coached in Italy in 2024 after leaving AC Milan, came back to Serie A and back for a second time to Florence to coach Fiorentina. There is an Italian saying “Minestra Riscaldata” which means reheated soup. It never tastes better the second time around. Stefano Pioli previously coached Fiorentina from 2017 to 2019, he was a player for Fiorentina from 1989 to 1995, and he was part of the Fiorentina side that was relegated to Serie B in the 1992-93 season.
This season, Stefano Pioli’s second reign in the dugout in Florence only lasted ten games in Serie A. In early November after the home defeat to Lecce, Pioli was sacked as the club was winless in the opening ten games of the season and found themselves bottom of the Serie A table with just four points from a possible 30. With the squad built and the money that was spent in the summer, that was a very disappointing blow for Fiorentina.
Before Pioli’s sacking, there was a domino effect with the club’s Sporting Director Daniele Pradè leaving after Fiorentina defeat to Inter Milan on match day nine. The replacement, which was unveiled in February 2026, was Fabio Paratici (formerly of Juventus and recently of Tottenham Hotspur). He was banned for 30 months where he was sporting director of Juventus were found guilty of false accounting and then subsequently deducted ten points in Serie A, a ban which ended in October.
Fiorentina spent big in the summer transfer window with €25m on Roberto Piccoli from Cagliari, Albert Guðmundsson loan being made permanent for €13m from Genoa, Simon Sohm from Parma for €15m, Nicolò Fagioli from Juventus for €13.50m, and Jacopo Fazzini from Empoli for €10m. Robin Gosens and Tariq Lamptey also arrived from Union Berlin and Brighton & Hove Albion for €7m and €6m, respectively, and there was the free transfer of Edin Džeko. Over €90m spent and after ten games of the season, the club was winless and found themselves bottom of the league.
Another former player in Paolo Vanoli was hired just four days after Pioli’s sacking. Vanoli, like Pioli, was part of a Fiorentina squad that was relegated from Serie A. Vanoli was part of the infamous 2001/02 Fiorentina squad when the club had financial problems and had to sell Manuel Rui Costa to AC Milan. Fiorentina was relegated and the phoenix club Fiorentina Viola was born.
Under Paolo Vanoli, Fiorentina managed to pick up their first win of the Serie A season on matchday 16. Fiorentina’s final home game of 2025 and they turned up and beat Udinese 5-1. Udinese goalkeeper Maduka Okoye gave Fiorentina a helping hand with a seventh minute red card for deliberate handball. This gave a winless Fiorentina the opening they were craving and did not look back and put a five-star performance.
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However, the eight games since the turn of the year and rolling into the 2026 has gone okay for Fiorentina. They have picked up two wins over Cremonese 1-0 and the emotional 2-1 away win in Bologna just two days after Rocco Commisso’s passing. That was sandwiched in between two draws away at Lazio and at home to AC Milan where Christopher Nkunku broke Fiorentina fans hearts with a stoppage-time equaliser.
What followed was just one point from the next four games, with three successive defeats to Cagliari at home 2-1, home to Como in the Coppa Italia 3-1 and Napoli away in Serie A 2-1, but they managed to pick up their first point since the Bologna away match with the home draw against Torino.
Fiorentina now find themselves five points behind Parma who occupy seventeenth position in Serie A. The next five league games will make or break their season: they play three teams who are around them in the lower half of the table in Pisa, Parma, and Cremonese, and they also have two tough away games to follow away at Como and at Udinese.
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In Europe in the UEFA Conference League, Fiorentina managed to finish in 15th position which guaranteed the club a play off spot. Fiorentina will take on Polish side Jagiellona Bialystock over two legs. Those games are sandwiched in between the Pisa home game for Fiorentina which a crucial game on Matchday 26.
It has now becoming a worrying state of affairs now at Fiorentina, as one of the seven sisters of Italian football are in real danger of falling through the basement door into Serie B. It is uncanny that the two coaches that were hired by Fiorentina have been part of squads that have been relegated from Serie A.
Can Vanoli engineer a last-gasp escape from relegation? Stay tuned for a heart-rendering final three months of the season.
By: Scot Munroe / @scot_munroe
Featured Image: @GabFoligno