Goals, autographs, dialect and... Totò: Pohjanpalo's new life in Palermo

Joel Pohjanpalo is someone who loves to feel part of a city, to live it, to identify with it. He did it in his Helsinki, then in Leverkusen, in Venice and now he is doing it in Palermo. He has taken a house in the historic center, as he did in the Lagoon where he was the only one who did not live on the mainland. He goes out, lives in contact with the people, signs autographs. Always keeping a low profile, the important thing is to let the pitch do the talking. And for now he has succeeded very well: three games, 2 goals and an assist. It was difficult to imagine a better start than this.

In Serie B this year there is more and more talk of a striker crisis. One above all, Coda. The former Genoa and Cremonese striker is struggling with Sampdoria: only six goals from August to today. Joel arrived in Palermo to solve the goal problem at home for the Rosanero. In fact, both Le Douaron, Henry and Brunori did not meet initial expectations (11 goals in 3 between the league and the Italian Cup) and the club chose to make a big move in January to aim for promotion. Since the Finn arrived, Dionisi's team has not lost: a goal to catch up with Mantova two Saturdays ago, the final stamp in the victory over Cosenza last Sunday. In a word, impact. And be careful, it's not just the goals. Pohjanpalo has integrated into Palermo right away. He is a team player, he spurs on his teammates and the fans are already crazy about him. He chose the number 19 - he had already had it in Hamburg five years ago - but this time it has a double meaning: he also learned that it is the number that Totò Schillaci had in the Magic Nights of Italia 90, he smiled and said he was happy to have taken it. Who knows, maybe it will bring good luck.

Today in Palermo you can meet him in the center with his wife Catharina and daughter Penelope. Just like he did in Venice. Up and down the streets of the center, he shops at the greengrocer, talks to people and breathes the city. Dry dribbling among tourists and goals, with simplicity as a business card to show. Those who know him (he has 2/3 Finnish journalists who follow him at every stage of his career) describe him as someone who wants to know everything about the place where he is, passionate about history and local culture. In Venice after less than a year he spoke like a “vecio di sestriere”, a real local. In Helsinki he produces his own wine, has a wine shop, gets informed, is passionate, studies. In Palermo he is burning stages in this too. Soon he will be able to act as a guide.

Pohjanpalo chose the pink and black team despite arriving from Serie A (he had scored 6 goals since August) leaving a place like Venice that loved him and where he felt at home. He chose Serie B, without the certainty of reaching promotion. In the national team he is always a starter, plays with continuity and goals and performances convince the coach Kanerva to call him, regardless of the category in which he plays. In Palermo, however, he arrived to be a protagonist and the start was absolutely in line with expectations. He who, among all his passions, has always had scoring goals as his favorite profession and who up to the quota of a thousand goals wrote down all the goals in a notebook, which then became an Excel file. Then he stopped, but who knows how high the count would be now. In Palermo, given how he started, the feeling is that there would be various columns to add. Or at least that is the hope.