In a fiery pre-match conference the manager, who saw his side slip to 13th in Serie A courtesy of a 4-0 defeat to Lazio on Monday night, responded to claims that the team had not shown enough heart or fight, saying that it was time to move on.

“We need to start fresh. All talk about Lazio ends here for me,” Italiano said

“I don’t want to talk about why we lost, why we didn’t manage to win or draw or win.

Fiorentina manager Vincenzo Italiano is under pressure due to recent Serie A.

“We know what went wrong and we know where to improve,”

The 3-0 victory over Hearts at Tynecastle last week helped get their Europa Conference League ambitions back on track, taking them second in Group A. It also served as a temporary distraction from their domestic woes. Having won just two of their first nine league games, they are looking to Thursday night’s match against the Robbie Neilson’s Gorgie side as another opportunity to get the fans back onside.

“I think this is the match where we need to react to the bad result against Lazio,” continued Italiano.

“We will go on to the pitch to confirm the good things we did against Hearts and in the first part of the game against Lazio.

“And then try to relaunch ourselves in Serie A where we are lagging behind a little bit, and in the Conference League, where we were lagging but we have been making up for that.

“So we need to confirm the good things we can do, and European games are showing you can never take a result for granted, there are no easy games.

“So we must play as we did last week.”

Defender Lorenzo Veniti understands the fans’ frustrations but sees the European matches as a way of making amends.

“If people are booing us it is because the expectations are very high,” said Venuti

“Playing in this competition is not a problem at all, it is a huge advantage to us.

“if a game goes badly like the Lazio one you can get revenge.”

Fiery Fiorentina press conference serves as warning to Hearts as Italians vow to react to criticism