The Thonon Black Panthers will be making their second road trip of the Central European Football League Championship to face off against Firenze Guelfi in Florence, Italy on Saturday, May 13th.
Firenze Guelfi, who are currently Italy’s top team sitting at 6-1 in the Italian Football League, will be facing the Thonon Black Panthers for the first time in CEFL play.
After sneaking past the Calanda Broncos 38-35 in their first-round matchup, the Black Panthers look to keep their CEFL Championship hopes alive. The dramatic 38-35 finish came down to the wire with Thonon prevailing and advancing to the next round.
After displaying a very balanced offense in their first matchup with 262 passing yards and 135 yards on the ground, led by QB José Tabora, who scored four touchdowns in his last outing, look for the Black Panthers to have a similar attack against Firenze.
The real difference Thonon under head coach Larry Legault made in their first-round matchup came on the defensive side of the ball. By the end of the game, the Black Panthers defense had four sacks and two interceptions that helped them seal the win. They will need their defense to perform just as well this week as Firenze has the highest scoring offense in Italy, putting up 264 points through seven games.
For Firenze, head coach Dan Levy has created an offensive juggernaut that looks to be very hard to stop. Led by quarterback Andrea Fimiani, the defending Italian Champs have dominated all other teams in the IFL in terms of scoring averaging 37.7 points a game.
Their offense looks like it is firing on all cylinders heading into this CEFL matchup as just last week they put on an offensive showcase in their last IFL win against Verona Mastini beating them 53-10.
The winner of this matchup will punch their ticket to one of the CEFL Championship Semifinals games on June 3rd.
