Mastermind Thiago Motta has Bologna fans dreaming of Champions League miracle - 'Never seen anything like this'

In Bologna, they are starting to believe. How could they not?

In Italy, Monday’s newspapers were plastered with words concocted by writers scrambling to find a fitting description for a stunning comeback against a Lazio side that had taken down Bayern Munich just three days earlier. Words like “miracle,” “fairytale” and “dream.”

Hours later, back at the club’s training base, hundreds of fans gathered to welcome their conquering heroes back after a successful raid of the Eternal City.

One of the more experienced of their number told Gazzetta dello Sport: “In 60 years, I’ve never seen anything like this.”

‘Like what?’, you may be asking around now. Well, Bologna are up in fifth in Serie A and only outside the top four on goal difference.

Their 12 wins are the most by this stage of a season by a Bologna side in 22 years, their 23 goals conceded the fewest since 1980-81, their four-match winning run the longest since 1967 and their 45-point total after 25 games the highest since the three-points-for-a-win era began. Like that.

Bologna are a big club with a proud history, but their greatest achievements are mostly remembered in grainy black and white, with six of their seven Scudetti coming before the war and the seventh coming in 1964.

Since then, the club has largely been a mid-table plodder, with occasional drops into the second and even third tier and only very occasional flirtations with Europe.

But now, ahead of the visit of Hellas Verona live on TNT Sports and discovery+ this Friday, the Rossoblu have every reason to believe that they are about to end a 25-year wait to reach a major European competition – and possibly even qualify for the UEFA Champions League for the first time.

The man overseeing Bologna’s remarkable campaign will be familiar to most European football fans; Thiago Motta won domestic and European silverware aplenty during his playing days with Barcelona, Inter and Paris Saint-Germain.

In only his third senior job and the first that has lasted more than a season following spells with Genoa and Spezia, the 41-year-old is already being talked up as a potential Juventus, AC Milan or Napoli coach – although interest is coming from overseas too.

After leading Bologna to their first top-half finish for the first time in a decade last season, Motta has developed his team’s slick, cohesive and flexible 4-2-3-1 formation and caused endless trouble for more illustrious and better-funded opponents.

With the second-highest average ball possession, third-highest distance covered and fourth-best defensive record in the league, this is a team that knows how to play, how to think and how to work hard.

It’s little wonder speculation has been rife about what Motta’s future holds, and his agent Dario Canovi has hardly cooled the talk, saying this week: “He’s used to the atmosphere of big teams, he knows how a coach must act and behave around great players. So I don’t think that it would be a problem for him to join a big team."

He added: “He won’t be lacking offers, not just in Italy but abroad. He’s very well known in Italy, but also in Spain and France they are following him."

For now, the former Italy international is earning adoration from the long-suffering Bologna supporters he has made dream again.

Fans have taken to calling him ‘Thiamo' Motta – a play on ‘Ti Amo (I love you)’ – on social media to express their feelings, just in case they weren’t clear enough already.

Motta isn’t alone in attracting attention from outside the Emilia-Romagna borders, though.

His star striker Joshua Zirkzee, scorer of a thunderous winner against Lazio, is having a breakthrough season that has seen him linked with Manchester United, Arsenal, AC Milan and even former employers Bayern Munich among others.

The 22-year-old Dutchman has 10 goals in all competitions already but the intelligence and technique of his all-round game has stood out, with six assists showing his willingness to set up team-mates and be far more than just a finisher.

After Zirkzee’s winner against Lazio, Motta drew a very generous parallel.

“[Zirzkee] said that his idols are [Zlatan] Ibrahimovic and [Gabriel] Batistuta, who are two excellent players,” said the coach.

“Seeing him day to day, he reminds me of the Ronaldinho I played with at Barcelona, but I cannot compare him to anyone.

“He is Joshua, he is special, he enjoys his football and above all works very hard in training.”

Scotland international Lewis Ferguson has also been a key man under Motta, his tireless work rate in the centre of the pitch matched by an impressive eye for goal and, since December, leadership qualities that have earned him the captaincy.

Ferguson became the top-scoring Scot in Serie A history ahead of Denis Law when he scored a winner against Atalanta before Christmas, and he’s since added a fifth goal of the season against Sassuolo to take his overall tally to 12 in 59 games for the club he joined from Aberdeen in the summer of 2022.

Come the end of the season, the 24-year-old will almost certainly be another player to court interest.

For now, serious questions are starting to be asked about whether Bologna can really reach the Champions League – especially with the possibility of fifth place being enough to earn a spot this season ahead of the change of format.

They are currently level on 45 points with Atalanta, four points clear of Roma below them with 13 games left.

In that period, Motta’s side still have to face five of the teams around them – Atalanta, Inter, Roma, Napoli and Juventus – but unlike all of those sides bar Juve, they do not have the distraction of midweek European games to contend with.

Plus, Milan are the only one of those teams to actually beat them yet this season. If Bologna can pick up three points against relegation-battling Verona at home on Friday night, it will be one step closer to this dream becoming a reality.

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