Futsal Cup, Final Eight kicks off: Domagnano and Fiorentino host the quarter-finals

The San Marino Futsal Championship has lowered the shutters, but only temporarily. It will reopen shortly before mid-May with the Preliminary Round, followed by all the hottest and most decisive matches of the season. In the meantime, it is the Futsal Cup’s turn to take centre stage. Last Tuesday the draw for the Final Eight was held, and tomorrow evening will see the opening act. There will be two venues, each appointed to host the games from one side of the bracket. Ties are single-leg, with extra time and penalties if required. At 20:15 in Domagnano, proceedings get underway with Domagnano v Juvenes Dogana. The two sides reach this stage after knocking out Tre Fiori and Tre Penne respectively. The league head‑to‑heads favour Cellarosi’s team, who won both home and away. Domagnano will have to deal with a suspension: coach Fabio Gasperoni will be without Santarini. Following on at 21:45, Murata and Libertas will battle it out for a semi-final place. For the Bianconeri this will effectively be their debut in this year’s competition, having skipped the first round by virtue of being the defending champions. Libertas, on the other hand, have already played, getting past Faetano thanks to a narrow first-leg win followed by a far more emphatic victory in the return. In the league, Murata claimed clear wins in both meetings. As mentioned, the winners will face whoever comes through Juvenes Dogana v Domagnano.

The other half of the draw will be played in Fiorentino. Pennarossa and Cosmos will open the evening, both sides currently outside the league’s Fab Four. The Chiesanuova side were finalists last time out and come into these Final Eight on the back of two wins over Fiorentino in the first round, also hoping that the Cup can rekindle the fire that has appeared in fits and starts for the Biancorossi over the course of the season, more like an underground stream than a steady flow. Cosmos knocked out Cailungo, but not without a scare: after a comfortable 5-0 home win in the first leg, their 1-5 defeat in the return leg caused quite a stir, with Bacciocchi’s goal – together with the final whistle – rescuing Franchino’s men from what would have been a sensational débâcle. Cosmos suffered the same margin of defeat in their league return fixture with Pennarossa, having in the first meeting clawed their way back to 3-3 by taking advantage of the second minute of added time. And, funnily enough, Bacciocchi was the star of the show on that occasion as well.

The second match of the evening (21:45) will be a showdown between La Fiorita and Virtus and, given how the regular league season ended, it also promises to be the most intriguing and finely balanced tie. Pietrangeli’s and Michelotti’s teams finished level on points in second place, a position ultimately earned by Virtus thanks to the head‑to‑head record, although that was not entirely one‑sided in favour of the Neroverdi, who opened up a two‑goal aggregate gap in the return fixture after the 4-4 draw in the first meeting. In the Cup, La Fiorita had things extremely easy against San Giovanni, beating them in both legs with double‑figure scorelines. Virtus had a much tighter second leg against Folgore (2-1), after a fairly clear‑cut 5-1 win in the first leg.

With the semi-finals to be played on Thursday, here is the schedule for the Titano Futsal Cup quarter-finals: