Amid the expanding universe of content created by the Big Bang of Budapest was a lovely video of the crowd at the Munster senior club hurling semi-final in Sixmilebridge, finding out in real time that Troy Parrott had scored and Ireland had won. Watching the kids dancing on the grass and the men staring with disbelieving delight at their phones, you could see the power of the moment. Even the people who had better things to do and weren’t watching the game were ecstatic to learn what had happened from the people who were.
Most people in Ireland probably had better things to do than watch Cremonese v Roma on Sunday afternoon. But at about 3.30pm Dublin time, Ireland’s WhatsApp groups again lit up with a great pulse of activity as tens of thousands of Ireland fans shared the longed-for news that Evan Ferguson had finally scored his first goal for Roma.
It had been a year and a month since Ferguson’s last club goal, during which time he’s played for three different clubs. How do you celebrate a moment like that? He jogged towards the corner flag holding a finger to his lips in the universally recognised “shut up” gesture.
Was this Ferguson lashing out at the doubters and haters? The smile said otherwise and the “shut up” seemed to be directed at the tracksuited Roma substitutes waiting to celebrate with him on the sideline. Maybe one or two of them had mentioned the goal drought.
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There was no ambiguity about the celebrations of his coach, Gian Piero Gasperini, who had just been sent to the stands for a row with the fourth official. Maybe he hammed up the exultation somewhat to make a point against the officials who had just sent him off, but his delight for the goalscorer was plain. It was also encouraging, because with the politicking that surrounds transfers at Italian clubs, it’s not always the case.
“I am happy for him,” Gasperini said. “He scored a very important goal in a game where we were playing well. The goal made us understand that we could win.”
The strange thing about the goal was how long Ferguson had been able to lurk near the Cremonese penalty spot totally unmarked before Neil El Aynaoui picked him out. Maybe the defenders hadn’t figured out yet who was supposed to be picking him up, as he’d only been on the pitch four minutes. When the ball came to him, he had time to take a touch before whipping it past the goalkeeper with a similar kind of shot to his goal against Armenia in Yerevan – hard but precise.
Before Sunday, Ferguson had played just over five hours of Serie A football. Those who have been watching along will know that most of that time has been spent looking forlornly back up the pitch as his team circulate the ball, with no apparent way of receiving it. If he does get a pass, he always seems to have his back to goal and a defender already on top of him. This is the negative pattern that had produced, before Sunday, just three shots on target in 10 appearances for Roma, with two of those coming on his debut back in August.
The Roma fans had seemed excited when he arrived – a (potential) €40 million signing from a Premier League club is a big deal in Italy these days – but zero goals in three months had cooled their ardour. Fans of big Italian clubs are not renowned for their patience with young project players, especially ones from the football backwater of Ireland.
Really, this is a race against time. Which will happen first – Ferguson figuring out how to find space in this league, or Roma deciding he’s not for them?
Last month, we had the first public criticism from Gasperini: “He needs to deliver on the pitch and at the moment, he is clearly falling short. Yesterday, I saw him do his first proper training session. He is 21 years old and has come back from seasons where he didn’t play much. We need to give him confidence, as is right, but the only solution is to work.”
In the next league match, with now-typical luck, Ferguson took a heavy foul in the first minute and was substituted off with the injury that led to him missing the recent Ireland games.
People say all kinds of mad things when delirious, but it was still puzzling, last week, to hear comments like: weren’t we lucky that Ferguson got injured when he did? Maybe it’s true in the narrow sense that if Ferguson had been there, the games would have played out differently. And for Ireland, it’s hard to imagine how those games could have played out more perfectly than they did.
But it was only thanks to Ferguson’s three goals in the first four games that Ireland went into the last two with an outside chance of reaching the playoffs. Just because Parrott delivered those incredible moments, it doesn’t mean Ferguson is now yesterday’s man. There’s no need for zero-sum thinking here. Both can be good. And for Ireland, surely, they can play together.
The three-man front line is the current orthodoxy in the Premier League. Not many teams are using two-striker formations. But there are some exceptions, usually among teams who sometimes play with three at the back. Brentford, for instance, play two up front pretty regularly, if they don’t start with a back four. And Ireland are a three-at-the-back team.
Heimir Hallgrímsson said last week that the switch to a system with three central defenders was due in large part to Ireland having a lot of talented centre backs, relative to other positions. It looks like we have a similar situation at the other end of the pitch.
Gasperini is a confirmed lone-striker guy, whose basic system is not very different from Ireland’s. The thing is that Gasperini likes a centre forward who can play with his back to goal and Ferguson, despite his early struggles, clearly has the makings of one of those.
He has the physical strength to hold off defenders and the accuracy to bring teammates into play. He demonstrated as much with his part in Roma’s third goal, coming deep and laying a first-time ball off to Stephan El-Shaarawy, who found left wing-back Wesley Franca racing into space to score.
Gasperini also believes good attacking movement is not a natural gift some lucky individuals happen to be born with, but a skill that can be taught, learned, coached. If Ferguson can stay consistent in training, he has the chance to learn a great deal from this coach.
Roma finished the game top of Serie A. Their lofty position might come as a surprise to those who followed Ferguson’s first few games, when the team didn’t look like contenders for anything.
But Gasperini has a huge reputation in Italian football for a reason and people believe he’s starting to build something at Roma. In the suburb of Garbatella, the artist Drugi created a mural of Gasperini in a witch’s hat and a Roma hoodie boiling up a cauldron of potion marked “Grinta, Cuore, Sudore” – grit, heart, and sweat. “I like these ingredients, they are the most important ones,” Gasperini says. “Then we can try and add some spices and salt.”
Sunday was the first time Gasperini’s team had scored more than twice in a game since he took charge in the summer. If Ferguson can stay fit and push for inclusion in a title-chasing Roma team, then maybe he could be the Scott McTominay of 2026. In Italy, there is no higher praise.
