Franco Mastantuono, Fiorentina's 19-year-old forward, suffered a second consecutive Serie A defeat on Saturday as Fabio Grosso's side were beaten 3-0 at home by newly promoted Frosinone — a result that arrived on the club's centenary and left the Viola without a point, without a goal, and rooted to the foot of the table after two matches.
The timing makes the situation harder to dismiss. A centenary fixture is the kind of occasion a club frames for posterity; instead, Fiorentina conceded three times and failed to score for the second game running. Seven goals against and none for across two matches is not a run of bad luck — it is a structural problem, and Grosso acknowledged as much after the final whistle, speaking of fragility, insecurity, and a great deal of work still to be done.
Mastantuono carries an average rating of 6.30 across his Serie A appearances this season, a number that reflects a player present but not yet decisive. His AI overall score of 55 out of 100 captures the same tension: the ceiling is credible at 72, but the distance between current output and that ceiling is real and, right now, widening with each defeat. At 19, development rarely follows a straight line, but the environment matters enormously. A forward needs teammates who can build platforms, a system that creates chances, and the confidence that comes from winning. Fiorentina are providing none of those things at present.
Grosso also addressed the absence of Kean, suggesting he would have played him — a comment that implies Mastantuono and others were asked to carry attacking responsibility without the full complement of options available. The club is moving to address its squad depth, with Alieu Njie arriving from Torino, but transfer activity takes time to translate into cohesion on the pitch.
Two matches into the 2026-27 Serie A season, Fiorentina sit twentieth with zero points, a goal difference of minus seven, and a head coach publicly naming fragility as the team's defining characteristic. For Mastantuono, the challenge is not simply to develop as an individual talent but to do so inside a club that is, at this moment, visibly struggling to function as a unit. The next fixture will tell a great deal about whether Grosso can arrest the slide before it becomes something harder to reverse.