Atalanta v Hellas Verona: the brainteaser
Three trivia on our 2024/25 Serie A MD9 game
For their second Gewiss Stadium seating of the week, Atalanta welcome Hellas Verona in the Saturday Night match scheduled for October 26. Kick-off against the Scaligiers is fixed for 20:45 CEST. Brace yourselves for our second back-to-back bout in Bergamo with our three trivia on the match at hand.
2017/18 Serie A: Which former Atalanta player scored to Hellas Verona with two different teams in the same season?
October 25 2017, on Wednesday night Atalanta and Hellas Verona crossed paths for their Serie A MD10 game. The first half proved itself well-balanced and hotly contested also due to the high tempo shown by both teams, who took it to the green ring head-on and with no holds barred. Despite the hosts setting up the game and the visitors retorting with speedy counters, also due to VAR, called into action twice to disallow one goal each (by Freuler and Kean respectively), the first half culminated in a goalless 0-0 stalemate.
The second half surely knew how to make up "for goals lost": vanquishing the yellow-blues for the second time, this time without any VAR interference, Remo Freuler opened the scoring on 50 minutes by capitalizing on Gomez's retrieval. 9 minutes later Atalanta doubled their lead with Ilicic, who made it 2-0 by converting Remo's assist through an angled daisy-cutter from the edge of the box. It then fell to Jasmin Kurtic to settle the score: after being subbed in in the second half, the Slovenian mid found his scoring ways on 76 minutes through his trademark move: namely bursting into the box and finalising Gosens' cross into the net.
Upon completing a move to SPAL in the winter transfer window, Kurtic went on to find his first goal with the Emilia side in the MD35 game played on April 29: sealing the Estensi's 3-1 on-the-road win over Hellas Verona.
How many times did Sulemana face Atalanta in his Hellas Verona days?
One of the two players to have swapped sides together with current teammate Isak Hien (who made 42 appearance during his season-and-a-half stint in Verona), Sulemana will dispute his first confrontation against the Scaligiers side, after having previously played an aggregate of 35 matches between the First Team (17) and the Primavera (18) outift. Whilst Saturday's game will have a "special flavour" to it for Sulemana, how many times had the Ghanian mid crossed paths with the black-and-blue shirt during his Hellas Verona days?
Had you answered two, you'd be partially right: despite being contended at a Youth Academy level (both dating back to the 2021/22 Primavera League) Ibrahim effectively faced Atalanta twice as a Junior Gialloblù.
Just like two were the games, this time at a Senior Level, that saw Sulemana vie the Nerazzurri during his stay in Cagliari.
Circling back to the main question, though, how many times did Sulemana take it to the Gewiss Stadium's pitch during his Hellas Verona days?
2022/23 season: after forfeting the reverse game due to injury, Ibrahim had to lie in wait until MD36 before having the chance to face Atalanta… And this time the Ghanian International truly made a great comeback, starting and clocking in the full 90 minutes of the game eventually won 3-1 by Atalanta.
The last 14 goals scored in Bergamo against Hellas bear the names of 14 different scorers.
Since the 2013/14 season (the year marking our first Serie A game against Hellas Verona in the third millennium) only twice did Atalanta not feature the home scoreboard : namely, in the 2014/15 MD1 game (a 0-0 draw) and in the 2020/21 campaign's Week 9 (a 0-2 win for the visitors).
Apart for the aforementioned two, the Nerazzurri hit the target in 7 games (3 wins, 2 setbacks and as many draws) for a total of 14 nets overall. 14 are also the players to have made it on the scoresheet in home clashes v Hellas Verona.
Follow-up question for all Atalanta fans with a mind like a steel trap: how about linking each scorer to the match?
Anyhow, here's the full slate (games are listed in chronological order)
- Atalanta 1-2 Hellas Verona, 2013-2014 Serie A MD34 (Denis);
- Atalanta 1-1 Hellas Verona,2015-2016 Serie A MD4 (Moralez);
- Atalanta 3-0 Hellas Verona, 2017-2018 Serie A MD10 (Freuler, Ilicic, Kurtic);
- Atalanta 3-2 Hellas Verona, 2019-2020 Serie A MD15 (Malinovskyi, Muriel, Djimsiti);
- Atalanta 1-2 Hellas Verona, 2021-2022 Serie A MD33 (Scalvini);
- Atalanta 3-1 Hellas Verona, 2022-2023 Serie A MD36 (Pašalić , Zappacosta, Højlund);
- Atalanta 2-2 Hellas Verona, 2023-2024 Serie A MD32 (Scamacca, Éderson);