Whatever happened in Fiorentina's 2017/18 campaign, it would have been overshadowed by the sudden and tragic death of Davide Astori. The club captain was just 31 years old when he died in his sleep from a cardiac arrest and his passing rocked not only Serie A, but the entire footballing world.
The fans' expectations before the season started were already dampened by the departures of several key players such as Federico Bernardeschi, Gonzalo Rodriguez, Borja Valero and Nikola Kalinic. It was always going to be a massive task for new coach Stefano Pioli to cope with such losses. The club did make some shrewd purchases in the transfer market including Jordan Veretout. The Frenchman was the surprise package of the season for the Viola with his craft from midfield and eye for a goal - including a superb hat-trick against Lazio. Speaking of hat-tricks, Giovanni Simeone also bagged one against Napoli to virtually end the Partenopei's title challenge and his tally of 14 goals was very respectable. He is young and still has plenty of growing as does 20 year old defender Nikola Milenkovic who showed great promise and could perhaps fill the massive hole left by Astori.
Up until Astori's death, the Viola endured a fairly uneventful and inconsistent season. They ended the year quite well with an eight match unbeaten run but six of those were draws and they faltered again at the start of 2018. They were down in 10th place on that fateful March 4th morning when the news broke of their captain's death but it appeared to galvanise everyone around the club. A seemingly directionless season suddenly had a purpose and Fiorentina began to play for Astori. They won five in a row and put themselves right back into contention for a Europa League spot but unfortunately couldn't quite maintain that form until the end.
Pioli will be hoping not to lose as many key players and be given some backing in the transfer market to return the club to European football.
