Brescia Face Serie B Match Without Boss Giampaolo, Who's Been AWOL Since Weekend

Brescia coach Marco Giampaolo has disappeared off the grid since the weekend, turned his mobile phone off and missed training sessions, leaving the Serie B side to go into a match on Tuesday night against Carpi without him.

The 46-year-old has not been seen since Saturday evening, when, according to Eurosport, he apparently held talks with a small selection of fans after Brescia's 2-1 loss to Crotone. It was their first defeat in the league this season:

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“Brescia, taking into consideration the temporary absence from training of coach Marco Giampaolo, have placed his assistants in charge of technical matters, in the hope that Giampaolo returns as soon as possible,” read a club statement.

“The club underline their total faith in the work of the coach.”

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Brescia only hired Giampaolo in the summer. He had a playing career in the lower leagues of Italian football before short spells as manager at the likes of Cesena, Catania, Cagliari and Siena over the past seven years, as per Soccerway.

In quotes from the Gazzetta dello Sport (Italian, translated into English by Football Italia), his club president Gino Corioni held out an olive branch, saying the club were keen for him to return:

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I’m hopeful that Giampaolo will return. I want to hear what serious matter has occurred for him to react in this way.

He’s not answering to anyone and I don’t know what is going on in his head right now. Perhaps he is a bit tired, but we will wait for him.

We’ve contacted no other tacticians.

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