Bad-luck Benevento sets unenviable standard for incompetence

In the history of Europe's top-five leagues, no team has suffered a worse start to a campaign than Benevento.

The ten-man top-tier newcomer was seconds from registering its first point of the season Sunday at home to Sassuolo before Federico Peluso's 94th-minute winner transformed carriages to pumpkins for the Campanian Cinderella story. That's now 13 defeats on the bounce for Benevento in its first season of Serie A football, breaking Manchester United's 87-year record of 12 losses to start a campaign.

Fellow top-tier strugglers FC Koln, Werder Bremen, Crystal Palace and Metz have all experienced shockingly poor early-season failures, but those tribulations pale in comparison to Benevento's trip ups.

A little luck wouldn't hurt either.

Related: The wait is over: Benevento promoted to Serie A for 1st time

With the most competitive Serie A campaign in years, the Italian top-flight is profiting from title challenges by the likes of Napoli, Roma, Lazio and Inter, and while Benevento has slumped to one-sided defeats against three of the aforementioned sides, fortune hasn't favoured Roberto De Zerbi's lot either.

Of Benevento's 13 losses, four have been courtesy of a blowout, the other eight by a one-goal margin. Among those eight defeats - including Sunday's result against Sassuolo where Peluso's 94th-minute goal was preceded by a penalty save by Alberto Brignoli - Benevento has conceded the result-clinching goal in extra-time on three occasions. Set for a maiden point a month ago at Cagliari, Benevento's hopes were crushed by Leonardo Pavoletti's goal with the last kick of the game in a 2-1 defeat. Same story, different setting when Torino's Iago Falque scored in the 92nd minute to best Benevento 1-0 in September.

Mired by a horrid spell and a league-worst minus-27 goal differential, Benevento hasn't done itself any favours, though it could use a little luck to go with composure in a match's waning moments.

Perhaps it's fitting that the club's crest features a witch, because there's clearly some form of sorcery plaguing Benevento's debut season in Serie A.