It had been coming for a while, yet there was still a sense of shock when AS Roma announced they had sacked Rudi Garcia and his coaching staff.
Recent poor results were cited as the reason for the Frenchman’s departure and there had been clear signals that all was not well at the club in recent months.
There are still, however, many questions over the former Lille manager’s time in Rome and it remains to be seen how he will be remembered by Roma fans.
It all started so well. Even after vice captain Daniele De Rossi had to Google Garcia to find out who he was, the Frenchman quickly made his mark. De Rossi was the first man to score under the new coach’s reign, sparking a record-breaking 10-match winning streak at the start of the 2013-14 season. Within that run, Roma beat Lazio for the first time since the infamous Coppa Italia final between the two sides. After that game, Garcia claimed he had “put the church back in the centre of the village”.
It looked as if he had. Roma were playing exciting, attacking football with new signings Kevin Strootman and Gervinho taking Serie A by storm, filling the void left by Erik Lamela.
The cracks did, however, appear in Garcia’s first campaign. These 10-straight wins were followed by a sequence of four draws against the likes of Sassuolo and Cagliari. Going into the mid-season break, Roma were right in the mix for the Scudetto. The game after Christmas was away at defending champions Juventus, but the Giallorossi were taught a lesson. A 3-0 thumping at the Juventus Stadium was a major setback which Roma could never recover from in terms of the Serie A title race.
Roma did continue their fine form, however, finishing the season with 85 points, a club record, which would have won the league in four of the five previous years in Italy.
The following season, Roma started in similarly fine fashion. Five wins out of five was the perfect lead-up to another game against Juventus. Yet once again, Roma were undone at the Juventus Stadium. The Giallorossi lost 3-2 and Garcia played an invisible violin, appalled with the decisions given against his side.
Just weeks later, Roma were thrashed in front of their own fans at the hands of Bayern Munich. The game against the German champions proved to be a turning point for Garcia in Rome. After this point, there was not the same enthusiasm around the Stadio Olimpico. Much like the previous season, Roma’s campaign faded away. Cup defeats to Fiorentina in both the Europa League and Coppa Italia denied Garcia the chance of silverware at Roma.
A highlight though was the penultimate match of the Serie A season where Roma beat city rivals Lazio to secure an automatic Champions League spot at the expense of their neighbours.
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At the start of this season, optimism was not at its highest in Rome but that quickly changed. In week two, they beat Juventus at home; they had finally beaten their nemesis. In the following weeks with Juventus’ awful start to the season, the talk around the city was this was the year Roma would win the title. But yet again, after a bright beginning, things faded for Garcia in Rome. A string of draws, a common occurrence in his reign in Rome, halted their charge. Another disastrous night in the Champions League at the Nou Camp further alienated fans. Even when they qualified for the last 16, they had done so with just six points from six games and with the worst defence in the competition.
Roma further stumbled in Serie A and were distanced from the frontrunners, including a resurgent Juventus. It is fitting that Garcia started with winning 10 games in a row and was sacked after just one win in the same space of time.
Garcia was ultimately sacked for not taking Roma beyond runners-up in Serie A. But in finishing second in the league three years in a row, Garcia did achieve something incredible, especially as in the three years before his appointment, Roma had finished sixth, seventh and sixth again. Garcia also brought in some fantastic players. In his first season, Mehdi Benatia was a star at the back and secured a huge move to Bayern Munich. The acquisition of Radja Nainggolan proved to be inspired while Miralem Pjanic became one of the best central-midfielders in Europe under the Frenchman.
But no one played more games under Garcia than Alessandro Florenzi, who has become an instrumental player for both club and country. Injury robbed Garcia of Strootman, who was on the verge of becoming a world-class midfielder while Gervinho was consistently hampered by niggles. The Frenchman also suffered when fans boycotted home games due to security measure brought into their home ground at the start of the 2015-16 season.
Whatever Garcia is branded in the months and years after his departure, he did something to Roma fans that they should never forget and always be thankful for. He made them dream again.
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