Brescia punish wasteful Torino as Tognon pulls the strings
Two old rivals, two shapes, and one lesson in ruthlessness: Brescia's shooting sharpness undid Torino's profligacy just as our preview warned it might.
Our preview called it: Torino would squander, Brescia would punish. On a tense evening the visitors took the points 3-2 and left their hosts to count nine shots on target and nothing to show for them.
Torino opened brightly enough, Filippo Morselli scoring after 13 minutes. Brescia answered through Mauro Tognon, then Lorenzo Valenti, and although Andrea Pomini pulled one back before the break, the pattern was set. Tognon was the night's finest, a goal and an assist, 13 kilometres of running and the composure that the home midfield lacked.
We had questioned whether Torino could afford to abandon their usual five at the back, and so it proved. Stretched in a 4-4-2, they lost the duel on their left flank and were picked apart through the middle. Marco Gnecchi and Dario Ceglia, paired in central midfield, never controlled the space in front of the defence; Tognon and Aleksandar Marković enjoyed it far too much.
Brescia's bench settled it. Davide Esposito, on after 62 minutes, scored the decisive third with a quarter of an hour left, and his interceptions snuffed out Torino's late push. Mansa Ouologuem, the summer arrival in goal, held firm under pressure.
Torino's old boys Dario Ceglia and Fausto Brenna, once of Brescia, could not turn the grudge their way. Roberto Buso limped off deep in stoppage time, a sour end to a night of honest running. The hosts had the chances; Brescia had the nerve. That, in this fixture, is usually what counts.