Reports suggest he wont start tonight (again). Last time he played was at home vs Fiorentina. I try to remember if he had any mistakes that game, anything that he failed at, but I cant. Still I, for one, am not worried that he`s not playing at this moment, he`s still a young player with lots of potential and strengths, and seems like he`s valued really high by the club and the coach - reports that the club rejected several offers for Daniele, one from Arsenal comes to mind, stating that the player is too important for Juventus and has a future here, and of course Allegri`s coments every time Rugani`s name pops up, he says all the kind and positive things. I trust the coach`s decision to use a delicate approach when the task is slowly introducing an young player into the starting 11. I believe that Daniele will be an important player for us and he`ll start games when the coach feels that he`s ready.
Now, what bothers me, is that even if he`s not entirely ready to be a starter, the people that actually start for us in those several games from the start of the campaign are not ready either. Benatia is a weak player, he lost his mojo, he was a good player before joining Bayern and for now we seem unable to revive him. I dont want to insult him, but he`s more of a liability to our defence, Barza is not that better choice either, he should be used mainly as a sub at the end of some games where we need his experience and leadership on the field, he can no longer play from the start of the game, he`s a football veteran and a professor at defending, its unfair to expect from him the same level of performance like few years ago, its simple - the more he plays, the more tired, exhausted and slow he`ll look and that would make him, like Benatia, a liability.
So in that situation, trusting a young and probably still not 100% ready Rugani instead of both Benatia and Barzagli seems to me like a well calculated risk and with his record so far for both Juve and Empoli the odds are still in his favour of producing solid and encouraging displays rather than failing to do so and becoming a liability in defence. Just my two cents...