AC Florence were dreaming of the Champions League, but instead are threatened with relegation. Robin Gosens explains how it got this far – and why things have recently started to look up again.
Robin Gosens spent the international break relaxing in the mountains, even if he would have preferred to be in Basel and Stuttgart instead of Merano. “As long as nobody tells me that this door is closed forever, this dream will always play a role in the back of my mind,” the 24-time international recently said about the World Cup, in which he will in all likelihood not take part.
This has to do not only with the competition for David Raum, Nathaniel Brown or Maximilian Mittelstädt, but also with what Gosens is going through in Florence this season. The proud Viola actually wanted to play in the European Cup for their 100th anniversary in the summer, preferably in the Champions League. Instead, they are facing their first Serie A relegation since 2001/02.
“This season is really a balancing act,” said Gosens in an interview with DAZN. “Last year, we qualified for the Conference League on the last matchday and somehow everyone had the feeling that it was a sign that we had miraculously got in.” But “then you start a season in which things suddenly don’t go the way you expected. Expectations were high – including my own. The coach even talked about the Champions League at the start, and I myself talked about surpassing the previous season. And then suddenly everything goes against you.”
The club had fallen into a “negative vortex”. “There are more and more setbacks, and I’ve also noticed that in myself. That can be transferred to the whole team and also to the fans.” This “huge disappointment” in turn led to pressure “that you put on yourself. As banal as it sounds, this pressure leads to heavy legs,” explains Gosens. “It makes everything seem more cumbersome, your performance gets worse, even though you actually want to achieve the opposite.”
“Putting individual goals on the back burner – be it a World Cup or a possible transfer”
Fiorentina have recently fought their way out of the depths of the table with three wins and just one defeat from seven games and are 16th, two points and two places above the first relegation place. “We’re not through yet,” warned Gosens, but spoke of a “positive trend”. But how did the team get out of the slump?
“The crucial point is to make this mental switch: to accept that this season is different. That ease, confidence and security are missing and that you need other things. I can no longer ‘bella figura’, as they say in Italy, i.e. just want to look good, but must do everything I can to stay in the league,” emphasizes Gosens. It’s about “putting individual goals on the back burner – be it a World Cup or a possible transfer. In a situation like this, you have to throw them overboard and say: Now it’s all about the team.”
On Saturday (6pm), Florence host penultimate-placed Hellas Verona, with the first leg of the Conference League quarter-final at Crystal Palace five days later. The competition is the only chance to fulfill their European Cup hopes after all: The winner will be allowed to compete in the Europa League in 2026/27.