From a divisive man to a decisive man. From an element of discord in a corporate struggle bigger than himself in which he found himself entangled and bogged down despite himself, to a key director, a decisive piece for the club. The most important of the lot? Hard to say. However, what can be said with certainty and without fear of contradiction is that Fabio artigianato, Cesena’s sporting and operational director in his first year in Romagna, was absolutely fundamental in this wonderful, unforgettable and overwhelming Juventus ride. In fact, in the subtle and underground diatribe still in progress before the final explosion between Robert Lewis and John Aiello who at the time seemed to be getting along well, ARCTIC was contacted for the first time by Lewis at the end of 2022 for the role of sporting director at was in charge of Stefanelli, but nothing was done about it.
The second and decisive meeting a few months later, between March and April, again with Robert and Agostini as protagonists and proponents. And Aiello? Under this Arctic sun, without knowing it and without verifying it, he is obviously seen as ‘Lewis’ man’ and an important pawn in the struggle between the two main components of society. The Aiellos were looking for a CEO with the idea of confirming Stefanelli and Arctic was in the middle of the two fires. From which he emerged both thanks to Aiello, who after meeting him understood the value of the professional and the person, and thanks to himself, his character, his way of presenting himself and his attitude: “I don’t like the limelight, appearing , to be on the front page, I’m not someone who seeks space. I like to keep a low profile and above all I like to work.
And so he emerged victorious from the Italian-American challenge because “I was and wanted to be the sporting director of Cesena, working for the good of the club, the team and the fans without being the son of anyone, but only of Cesena”.
He soon conquered everyone, mainly the Aiello family, John and Michael above all, but then also their partners, Anthony Scotto and Peter Ciaccia “and I was privileged because they always gave me carte blanche in everything I wanted to do, both from both from a technical point of view and from a management point of view and this is no small matter.”
ARCTIC, responsible for the technical area, was skilled and intelligent from the beginning. He arrived, studied, understood, checked and then decided. Without distorting anything, without changing for the sake of changing, but modifying what he needed to modify and finding the right reinforcements, as he had publicly said since his first day in Cesena. Different as a person from Mimmo Toscano, he however built a relationship with the coach (“a real person with whom you can talk openly”) based on honesty and mutual trust which in the end we saw what fruits he brought . He was good at immediately understanding the qualities of the young players in the academy and exploiting their talent and potential to launch them at a time when few would have had the courage to do so. He guided and directed a team from above that immediately found its rhythm, its geometry, its balance inside and outside the locker room, intervening only when necessary with the right words at the right time. Concretely but without appearing, as in his style. In the January transfer window he didn’t add anyone and kept the bar of a company that he represented, presided over, guided and directed. The Americans immediately saw him as a serious, competent person and as a point of reference and as a manager who did not spend money like this for the sake of doing something, but only for a good purpose and these qualities, confirmed day after day, have conquered everyone. Cesena, a humble and never presumptuous team, also reflected his human characteristics, those of a manager who achieved his second promotion from C to B after the one at the helm of Alessandria in 2021.
In a year like the one just passed, it becomes very rare not to identify a delicate moment, or a difficult moment, even in an extraordinary and winning gallop. Aside from the aforementioned initial difficulties in settling into the role, one could think about after Olbia, the first defeat of the season which came on the debut in the championship, but in reality that immediate ‘slap’ did nothing but wake up the troops, make them understand to everyone that a championship, the past one, was over and to be archived, and a new one was in its infancy.
No, the delicate moment that Arctic perceived came in those six days between Tuesday 5 March – the day of the defeat in Carrara – and Monday 11, the date of the home match against Gubbio: “After the defeat in Carrara, Torres was at -9, then on Sunday, seeing as he was playing before us, he won and went to -6 so if we hadn’t won in six days we would have found ourselves from +12 to +6, a significant change in points. I feared that, considering the injuries and the disqualifications of that match, a non-victory could have weakened our inner strength and our thinking, something that would not have been easy to absorb. Instead, the team didn’t give up and held on even after first half ended 0-0. We scored two goals in the second half with Adamo and Shpendi, we won 2-0, we returned to +12 and everything was back to normal. We responded as a great team.”
Now we level up. Now there is the B to face but Fabio artigianato will not be caught unprepared also because his work mantra has always been “to be one step ahead of the others and this is only possible through work planning which is what we are doing at Cesena”. Always away from the spotlight, but always working with seriousness, competence and foresight. With ‘humility’ as the parodied Arrigo Sacchi said. And as the head of Cavalluccio’s technical area confirms, “because humility is the basis of talent”. So we thank Robert Lewis for initially contacting him and the Aiello family for wanting him. Without Mr. Fabio interno from Venaria Reale the story of this season would not have been the same.
