At the final whistle, Paulo Dybala took the ball in his hands and handed it to Donyell Malen. A simple gesture, almost instinctive, but one that says much more than a celebration. That ball was the memory of the Dutchman’s first Serie A hat-trick, but above all the symbol of a footballing relationship that is beginning to feel increasingly special. Dybala chose to hand it to his teammate himself, as if to confirm a mutual trust built over just a few months. A ball to take home, three goals to remember and a clear message: when the two of them are playing like this, Roma have everything they need to dream.
At the Olimpico, on the opening day of the season, Gian Piero Gasperini’s side swept Fiorentina aside 4-0 and began the campaign with a performance that went beyond the scoreline. Because while Pisilli also got on the scoresheet, the real spectacle was the one built around the Dybala-Malen partnership. Three assists from the Argentine, three goals from the Dutchman: a perfect division of labour that turned the evening into a display of strength. And understanding. But the most interesting thing is that this story did not begin today. Dybala and Malen have played together seven times and, in those seven appearances, the Dutch forward has scored seven goals, receiving six assists from the Argentine. Numbers that tell the story of a connection that has already become decisive and that against Fiorentina grew stronger still. Three assists in the same game for the same teammate’s hat-trick are rare: in Serie A, it had not happened since 2 May 2021, when Emanuel Vignato supplied three assists for Rodrigo Palacio in a match between Bologna and Fiorentina. The difference, though, is that this time those three assists carried enormous symbolic weight as well.
Dybala did not simply put Malen in position to score: he kept looking for him and finding him. The first goal came in the 27th minute, when the Argentine skipped past half the Viola defence before picking out the Dutchman for the opener. After the break, the pair picked up where they had left off: two more assists from Dybala, two more goals from Malen, and the hat-trick was complete. It was also from here that Roma had found their way through last season. When the team needed the decisive change of pace to reach its Champions League objective, it was precisely the two most talented forwards who dragged them there. Malen had scored the goal that opened the decisive match against Verona, the one that sent the Giallorossi back into Europe’s elite competition after seven years. Dybala, on that same evening, had provided two assists, one to the former Borussia Dortmund forward, naturally, and another to El Shaarawy. That Roma side had found in the Dybala-Malen partnership one of the keys to completing the chase.
But the new season has meant starting again from zero. A new campaign, a few new teammates, all the balances to rebuild and, above all, a Champions League campaign to face. Gasperini has a team that wants to turn last year’s third-place finish into something more ambitious still. The first answer from the Olimpico was emphatic. Malen, after all, is no longer simply the forward who arrived in January to add pace and goals: he has become an absolute point of reference. His hat-trick against Fiorentina is the best possible way to pick up where he left off in May. The Dutchman attacks space, knows how to move between defenders and, above all, seems to have found in Dybala the player capable of reading his movements a fraction of a second before anyone else. There is a naturalness to it now, almost.
And Dybala? He is the player who can change Roma’s dimension, but also the one around whom the main question of the season revolves. Against Fiorentina, he looked like the Dybala of his best days: inspired, free to move, capable of finding the touch that breaks the balance. Three assists are the perfect picture of an evening in which almost every intuition produced something. That is why the ball handed to Malen at the end of the match is worth more than a simple image. It is the symbol of a partnership that has already learned to run on mutual trust. Dybala knows that Malen can turn his ideas into goals; Malen knows that, with Paulo moving around him, the chances will come. It feels simple now.
There remains one condition, though, as large as an entire season: Dybala’s fitness. The Argentine’s talent has never been in question, nor has his ability to illuminate a game. The real question is how often Roma will be able to have him like this, available and decisive. If the answer is often enough, and if Malen continues to turn into goals what Paulo puts in front of him, then Gasperini’s side can genuinely try to take a step beyond third place. The first evening has already shown that the partnership is there. And the ball Malen carried away from the Olimpico, with Dybala’s signature on it, is perhaps the best possible manifesto for the new Roma.