Coladeros Invitational Serie A Extravanganza — GW1–7

6 min readMar 5, 2024

7 men. 1 league. Umpteen teams and a game that's fucked over more players in 22 years than Bernie Madoff. This is the CISAE!

Brescia

NJ Gotti’s mercenaries have had a sterling start to the season despite an injury crisis in defensive midfield and European football. One of the easier fixture lists has seen them rack up the wins — and they sit unbeaten in the league after 7 games with a whole host of scorers. Considering he’s still trying to work out his best side, and Davids/Vogel have been injured and suspended almost every game so far this is a very promising start to the season.

Best Result — 2–1 vs Milan on the opening day

Star Man — Roy Keane 8.29 average in 7 games.

Grade — A

Fiorentina

The Jekyll & Hyde of the league so far. They’ve scored bucketloads with Tsigalko and Konstantinou forming a partnership worthy of a 70s Mining club double act we shall herein call Leek and Potato — and Vampeta has been an absolute collosus in DMC. However, despite beating Roma, Milan and Brugge 7–0 in the UEFA Cup, three defeats on the spin against other managers has led him to pelting Welsh cakes at his hapless defense, Elefthropoulos in particular coming under pressure from Iker Casillas.

Best Result — 3–0 vs Roma

Star Man — Michalis Konstantinou with 14 goals in 9 games.

Grade — B-

Lecce

Having played half of my games against other managers, I’m pretty happy with results so far. We managed to beat Juventus by kicking the living fuck out of them which has been a running theme so far as I lead the league in yellow cards with 18, but a disappointing 3 assists combined from Giggs and Figo has led me to promoting Arjen Robben early to compete for a starting place. Concerningly, I’ve only had one goal not scored by Guede, Ortega or RVN.

But I also beat Roma so fuck everyone else.

Best Result — 2–1 vs Roma

Star Man — Ruud Van Nistelrooy 9 goals in 8 Ave Rating 8.44

Grade — B+

Torino

After 3 games, Steve was very much Clint Eastwood in Gran Torino — sitting on his porch scowling at anything that moved whilst he waited for the sweet embrace of death, and a goal. But a bold tactical change has turned him into Dirty Harry, with a Magnum-blasting 6–0 win in the cup leading to him reeling off 4 wins on the spin in the league, including a spectacular come from behind 90th minute winner in the Turin derby. Jeremies and Tommasi have been typically difficult to deal with (and both suspended once already) and Aimar has begun to tick in midfield — Nikiforenko the big disappointment so far with 1 goal in 8 games.

Best Result — 4–3 vs Juventus

Star Man — Christian Vieri 8 goals in 8 games, Ave Rating 8.63

Grade — B-

Udinese

xG experts the world over are scratching their heads at this one — mostly because their profession is bullshit. He’s drawn a blank in 5 of his 7 games, despite registering an astonishing 57 shots combined in these games (and 91 shots in his 7 league games). Victim of 3 keepers having MOTM performances against him, he certainly has plenty of reasons to not be too downhearted. All of his players have actually played alright as well — which means that we can only blame Canada for this level of underachievement so far. Big test will be the next 9 games where he plays 5 other human managers. Expect tinkering aplenty here.

Best Result — 1–0 vs Torino

Star Man — Patrick Vieira Ave Rating 8, 6.4 Tackle per Game

Grade — D

Venezia

A disappointing opening to the season led to a switch in formation, which came up trumps as Penner’s men pulled off 3 increasingly impressive victories in September — before being derailed by a Totti red card against Lazio for trying to kill Stefano Fiore.

Wilfried Bouma has been hugely impressive so far from the left, but he’s also seen sterling turns from the likes of Solis, Landreau and John Welsh as he gives youth plenty of chances to develop. Played 4 of the 5 stronger AI sides as well so a very decent start

Best Result — 2–1 vs Fiorentina

Star Man — Wilfried Bouma Ave Rating 8.33, 4 assists

Grade — B-

Verona

Its an absolute goalfest in fair Verona, with Martyn (Mike) harking back to yesteryear with a string of highly impressive results after being champed by Roma on the opening day of the season. Kieron Dyer has been a revelation unleashed in CM, and it looks like he might even be getting the best out of Riquelme, who has 3 goals and 4 assists through 8 games.

Outwith Roma and being beaten by the Middlesborough of Serie A — Atalanta — this has been a hugely impressive opening to the season for the Gaffer to everyone bar Fabian Barthez, who is getting increasingly annoyed at getting left out for Buffon. I can hear the drinks globe opening for this to be pondered…

Best Result — 2–1 vs Lecce

Star Man — Kieron Dyer 5 goals, Average Rating 8

Serie A

Milan look like early contenders to be the big-trouble-in-little-Italy team, with 5 points from 7 games and Rui Costa angling for a move away. Its a pretty congested table, with Lazio leading the way by virtue of being utter bastards and having played 4 of the bottom 5 teams.

NJ leads the way from the human mangers with his defensive record notable as the best in the league so far. Chievo are probably the surprise package because they’re inadvertently edited from another save I had, so they’re powered by the likes of Facundo Sava and Mehdi Mahdavikia.