FLORENCE, Italy (AP) – Coach Stefano Pioli was fired by Fiorentina on Tuesday after the club failed to win in 10 matches. Serie A.
The move came two days after the Tuscan national team’s crisis deepened after a 1-0 home loss to Lecce.
Fiorentina are second from bottom, one point ahead of Genoa, with only four points from four draws and six losses.
“Fiorentina can confirm that Stefano Pioli has been relieved of his duties as head coach of the first team,” the club said in a statement. “Daniele Garoppa will take charge of the first team on an interim basis from this afternoon’s training session.”
Pioli’s dismissal comes after Fiorentina announced on Saturday that it had terminated the contract of sporting director Daniele Prade by mutual consent.
Pioli was appointed when former Fiorentina manager Raffaele Palladino abruptly resigned after leading the club to sixth place last season.
Fiorentina have been doing well in Europe recently, winning back-to-back runners-up in the conference league finals and then reaching the semi-finals last season.
After two games in this season’s conference league, Fiorentina is in first place. The Viola next visit Mainz on Thursday.
Fiorentina’s next Italian league game will be in Genoa on Sunday, a clash between the two bottom-ranked clubs.
Pioli led AC Milan to the Serie A title in 2022 and later coached Cristiano Ronaldo at Al Nasr in Saudi Arabia before joining Fiorentina.
This will be the third change of manager in Serie A this season, after Luciano Spalletti replaced Igor Tudor at Juventus and Patrick Vieira left at Genoa.
___
AP Soccer: https://apnews.com/hub/soccer
