As we enter Season 10, Genoa enter our 2nd Season in the top flight, looking to go 1 better with our target of bettering our top 6 finish of last season or come away with some silverware, being much higher than our Chairman's target of avoiding relegation. There are 4 more players due in to join Giovinco as the new (or returning in Giovinco's case) recruits. Stephan El Shaarawy will also be returning on Monday along with Pedro Pereira, with Nkunku and Loftus-Cheek leaving us. Gianluca Mancini moves in exchange for Michael Keane on the 6th April, followed by Tiemoué Bakayoko in exchange for Juan Bernat 2 days later.

Domenico Criscito continues as club captain with goalkeeper Mattia Perin as deputy, keeping the Genoese roots of the club. Salah will remain as the club's number 9, with Seba Giovinco to be used as a suber sub. SES, Ziyech, Oyarzabal, Vinicius Jr & Ox will all be used to support, with our 1st choice pairing of Doucouré & Bakayoko holding the Midfield together. We will be hoping that come the end of the season, Kouamé, Leão, Zaniolo and hopefully 1 or 2 others from our youth team will be at the level to compete for minutes.

For the pre-season, our youth team will be playing the next 3 games against Zenit, Fiorentina & CSKA. With the 1st team back for the final friendly in the Derby d'ella Lanterna v Samp.

Genoa have made a decent start to life in the Top 100 currently sitting in 4th place in Division 4, but Hirst has convinced President Preziosi to get the cheque book out by spending 13.2m on 2 new recruits in the last few days…The first new signing arrived last weekend for 4.3m in Olivier Ntcham, the Manchester City graduate chose Genoa after turning down offers from Madrid, Benfica & Sevilla and Hirst believes this kid has a huge future at Genoa!

Ntcham is pleased to join the Rossoblu

Ansaldi stays behind in Genoa

Genoa may have made the surprise signing signing of the summer in old foe, Antonio Cassano…


Cassano played in the Derby della Lanterna 7 times against Genoa, for City rivals Sampdoria, but only ever managed 1 goal, constantly being overshadowed by Rossoblu favourite Diego Milito.

Antonio is going to have to do a lot to become a fan favourite for Genoa after being on the wrong end of a lot of stick off Genoa fans, including Coach Hirst…

after scouring Hirst's facebook page, this image was found posted on 21/01/2009

Hirst was quoted as saying, "Antonio may have once been our enemy, but we will welcome him back to the Stadio Luigi Ferraris, a ground he knows very well and is looking forward to his return against Hertha Berlin next thursday, but first will be his debut in Hamburg on Sunday night!"

With Hirst also coaching La Nazionale, Cassano will be hoping to impress enough to work his way back into the Italy squad!

Genoa coach, Frank Hirst made it his first aim to bring in a couple of quality young forwards and Belotti was his first target, shelling out 9.6m for the Italy U21 International. To partner him or play on the wing is 23 year old Swiss International, Haris Seferovic, costing 4m, Pandev & Gakpe from Eintracht Frankfurt!