With Santiago Castro confirmed as a departure — the Argentine forward heading to Roma after a farewell message that drew a line under his time in Emilia — Bologna's attacking hierarchy has shifted, and Thijs Dallinga, the rossoblù's 25-year-old Dutch forward, enters the new season as the uncontested focal point of Vincenzo Italiano's attack.
The significance is structural. Castro's exit removes the competition that kept Dallinga's role conditional last season, when the Dutchman managed two goals and two assists across 22 Serie A appearances — a return that reflected a squad role rather than a starting one. With an AI overall rating of 56 out of 100 and a potential ceiling of 68, the data frames him as a player still developing, not yet the finished article, but one with clear room to grow if given consistent minutes. That opportunity has now arrived by default as much as by design.
Dallinga has already moved to claim it. His goal in Bologna's 2-0 pre-season win against Iraklis — with winger Rowe also on the scoresheet — gave Italiano's side their first victory of the summer and placed the Dutchman at the top of the scoring sheet before a competitive ball has been kicked. The result matters less than the signal: Dallinga is sharp, present, and first in line.
The club around him is in active motion. A new midfielder has arrived from Estudiantes, Jhon Lucumí is the subject of reported interest from Como — with Bologna holding firm at €23 million — and the Castro deal has brought a reported incoming move for Roma forward Artem Dovbyk. That last piece is the one that complicates the picture. If Dovbyk arrives, Dallinga's newly elevated status becomes contested again, and the question of who leads the line in Italiano's system reopens immediately.
Bologna finished the 2025-26 Serie A season in eighth place with 55 points from 37 matches — a record of 16 wins, seven draws, and 14 defeats, with 46 goals scored and 43 conceded. It is a profile that suggests a side capable of competing in the upper half without yet threatening the European places consistently. Improving on that requires a striker who can contribute more than the two goals Dallinga produced last season, and the summer has been constructed — consciously or not — to give him the conditions to do exactly that.
Whether Dovbyk arrives or not, Dallinga enters pre-season with more clarity about his role than at any previous point in his Bologna career. The squad is being rebuilt around a different shape, and his name is on the scoresheet while the rebuild is still underway. That is not nothing.