Futsal, league and Titano Futsal Cup fixtures drawn

The draws for the official fixtures for the 2023-24 San Marino futsal season have just been completed. Fiorentino, reigning champions of both the Campionato Sammarinese and the Titano Futsal Cup, will begin their defence of the two trophies on Monday 2 October, when the opening matchday of the new league season will be played. As usual, games can be moved to the following day or days as part of the rescheduling process. By that date we will also know whether Matteo Michelotti’s Rossoblù have added the Supercoppa Sammarinese to their honours list, with the match scheduled for 26 September. The date is now official for the third meeting of 2023 with Folgore with silverware at stake. Once again at the Multieventi, the venue of Fiorentino’s previous two triumphs, the club from Falciano – recently entrusted to head coach Claudio Zonzini, formerly of Juvenes-Dogana – will try to defend the only title it still holds and deny their highly rated opponents a treble of trophies in the same calendar year. Kick-off for Fiorentino-Folgore is set for 21:00 at the Multieventi. The match will be shown live via streaming on TITANI.TV and free-to-air on San Marino RTV (CH. 831 DTT). In the meantime, at the Casa del Calcio, the fixtures for the Campionato Sammarinese and the bracket for the Titano Futsal Cup have taken shape. There are no restrictions for the league, where the fifteen participating teams will face each other over 30 regular-season matchdays before the start of the post-season. Unlike in eleven-a-side football, the champions of San Marino will be decided through the play-offs. Last season’s leading sides will open against Tre Penne and Libertas: the Granata face the tough task of taking on Folgore, while the club from Città will immediately be tested by Fiorentino. The ties Virtus-Murata and Tre Fiori-La Fiorita also stand out, as they should offer an early indication of the renewed competitiveness of teams seeking confirmation or aiming higher. Here is the schedule for the first matchday of the 2023-24 Campionato Sammarinese futsal season: Fiorentino, Folgore, Tre Fiori and La Fiorita will start from seeded positions in the Titano Futsal Cup. In particular, the holders Fiorentino will benefit from an automatic bye into the quarter-finals, while the other three clubs are locked into fixed positions in the bracket, ensuring they cannot meet each other before potential semi-finals or the final. These advantages are a reward for their results over the last five years and for the most recent triumph in the competition. For the remaining eleven teams, the draw was open and not subject to any seeding criteria. All rounds of the competition, apart from the final, will be played over two legs, home and away, with no ranking advantage should the aggregate score be level at the end of the second leg. If the tie remains all square, two five-minute periods of extra time will be played, followed if necessary by penalties. In the top half of the bracket there are seemingly well-balanced ties such as San Giovanni-Domagnano and Pennarossa-Juvenes-Dogana. La Fiorita will be favourites over two legs against Tre Penne, while Fiorentino will await in the quarter-finals the winner of the tie between Lupi and Puma. In the bottom half of the bracket there is another Murata-Virtus, just as on the opening day of the Campionato Sammarinese futsal season: the winners will face whoever comes through the match between Faetano and Tre Fiori. From the Borgo Maggiore Castle derby between Libertas and Cailungo will emerge the team that will take on the winner of the Serravalle Castle derby between Cosmos and Folgore, in which the Rossoneroverdi appear to have a slight edge. The first legs are scheduled for Thursday 19 October, with the possibility of one or more games being postponed. The second legs will not be played before 9 November. Here is the line-up for the round of 16 of the 2023-24 Titano Futsal Cup:

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