Fiorentina blows past Benevento 4-1 in Coppa Italia with lightning-fast start

Fiorentina wasted no time at the Artemio Franchi, routing Benevento 4-1 in a Coppa Italia match that was all but decided before halftime even arrived. With two goals in the opening 34 minutes and two more inside two minutes to start the second half, the home side snuffed out any resistance from the visitors, who could only put a dent in the final score with a goal from Davide Lamesta.

A lightning-fast start

The match could not have started better for the hosts: barely a minute had gone by when Albert Gudmundsson headed home from close range to make it 1-0. Benevento tried to respond through a few chances from Francesco Salvemini and Davide Lamesta, but it was Fiorentina who kept striking. In the 34th minute, Moise Kean finished with his right foot inside the box off a cross from João Mário to make it 2-0, a scoreline that held until the break despite a few Benevento attempts from outside the area that failed to find the target.

The second half, an avalanche

If the first half had already been tough for Benevento, the start of the second was downright crushing. In the 47th minute, moments after the restart, Luca Ranieri headed in from point-blank range off a corner kick to make it 3-0. Two minutes later, in the 49th, Cher Ndour extended the lead with a left-footed finish set up by Marco Brescianini to make it 4-0. In a matter of seconds, the match had gone from under control to a rout. Benevento pulled one back in the 53rd minute through Davide Lamesta, who fired a left-footed strike from outside the box to make it a final 4-1, but there was no room left for any more drama on the scoreboard.

The numbers behind the match

The stats reveal a curious detail: despite the lopsided score, Benevento actually had more possession and more total shots, though Fiorentina was far more clinical in front of goal.

Our own expected goals estimate for the match also backs up the home side's offensive edge at the key moments: 2.659 for Fiorentina compared with 1.666 for Benevento, a gap that confirms that even though the visitors controlled the ball more, it was the hosts who found the decisive spaces.

What the preview said

The projection published before kickoff gave Fiorentina a 51% chance of victory, against 25% for Benevento and 24% for a draw, with expected goals of 2.06 for the home side and 1.43 for the visitors. The final result ended up being even more emphatic than that projection suggested: Fiorentina did not just win, it did so with a four-goal rout that blew well past those preview numbers.

What the match leaves behind

With substitutions like the second-half introductions of Franco Mastantuono, Dodô and Christ Inao Oulaï, Fiorentina was able to manage its effort once the result was settled. For Benevento, aside from Lamesta's goal, what remains is the feeling of a stretch between the end of the first half and the start of the second that proved fatal, conceding three goals in barely six minutes that killed off any hope of an upset in this round of the Coppa Italia.