Fiorentina arrived at MAPEI Stadium - Città del Tricolore having won none of their last five Serie A matches, and left with a 4-2 victory over Sassuolo that was effectively decided by two goals straddling half-time — one in first-half stoppage time and one in the opening minutes of the second half.

The match turned on a three-minute passage either side of half-time. Sassuolo forward Armand Laurienté had given the home side the opener at 25', converted from a Sebastiano Esposito delivery, and that lead held through a fractious closing quarter of the first half — Fiorentina defender Radu Drăguşin and forward Alieu Njie both collected yellows in the 42nd and 44th minutes respectively, and Sassuolo's Ibrahim Sulemana was booked at 40' before being withdrawn at 45'. Then, in first-half stoppage time, Fiorentina forward Mateo Pellegrino levelled with an assist from Njie, and at 50' Njie himself got on the scoresheet, with Marco Brescianini providing the assist to put the visitors ahead. Two goals in the space of a few minutes, straddling the interval, erased Sassuolo's lead and handed Fiorentina control they would not relinquish. Laurienté pulled Sassuolo level again at 65' — his second of the afternoon, assisted by Nemanja Matić — but a Franco Mastantuono goal at 79', assisted by substitute Pote, and a Valde finish deep into stoppage time at 90+3' closed the account at four.

Njie is the figure this match will be remembered by. The Fiorentina forward assisted the equalizer in first-half stoppage time, then scored the lead-taking goal at 50', with Brescianini supplying the assist, and was substituted off at 63' — his afternoon's work already done before the hour was complete. Both contributions came in the period when the match was most open, and both were decisive in the sense that they shifted the scoreline from Sassuolo's favour to Fiorentina's. The substitution of Njie at 63', with Wilfried Gnonto coming on, is a fact the data records without explanation; what is not in doubt is that Njie had already shaped the result by then.

Sassuolo's regret is structural rather than incidental. Laurienté scored twice and Esposito contributed an assist, so the attacking resources were present. The problem was a defence that conceded four without a single penalty or own goal, and a team that led at 25', drew level again at 65', and both times ended up behind. Sulemana's yellow card at 40' and his subsequent substitution at 45' disrupted whatever shape Sassuolo's coach Alberto Aquilani had constructed for the second half, and the two goals conceded in the 45+2' and 50' window suggest the disruption was not absorbed. Conceding at 79' and again at 90+3', when the match was already lost, underlines a defensive fragility that has been consistent: Sassuolo had shipped 22 goals in nine league matches before this fixture.

The form context sharpens the picture. Sassuolo came in having taken one point from their last five matches, with four defeats and fifteen goals conceded in that span. This result does not alter that five-match window — it remains one draw and four defeats — and the last-three window, three consecutive defeats with no points, is unchanged. Fiorentina's trajectory is more instructive: they arrived with no wins in their last five, but this victory moves them to one win, one draw, and three defeats across that same window. The last-three frame is more encouraging still — one win, one draw, one defeat, with seven goals scored against six conceded. Paolo Vanoli's side needed this badly, and the manner of it, overturning a deficit through a concentrated burst of goals, at least suggests a capacity for momentum within a match even when the broader season has lacked it.

Two teams in the lower reaches of the table, both searching for form, and it was the visitors who found it in the minutes that mattered most.