Fabio Quagliarella (129 Viewers)
- Thread starter Dostoevsky
- Start date
Juventus Search For A Bomber: Is The Answer Already Here?
Almost every assessment of Juventus this season seems at some point to reach the conclusion that the one thing the team is missing is that elusive “proper striker”. The absence of a line leading, goal-poaching, twenty five goal a season Capocannoniere challenger is deemed to be the missing piece in the Bianconeri jigsaw assembled by Beppe Marotta this summer.
Many match reviews, including those for the Bologna & Brescia games here on Il Tifosi have reached this same conclusion, with Giampaolo Pazzini & Edin Džeko offered as solutions. Plenty of other outlets tout names on a daily basis, seemingly on a rota basis as the rumour mill churns out the same players time after time. However the solution - until next summer at least - may well already be at the club.
Fabio Quagliarella is a much maligned striker. Often derided as a “playstation player” due to he propensity for scoring spectacular goals, he is viewed as an inconsistent, infuriating & unreliable player, the cliched 'scorer of great goals but not a great goal scorer’ line is often trotted out to describing him. Any search for him on YouTube will confirm this, any compilation of his goals looks like the results for a Goal of the Season compilation.
His career started slowly, & throughout his ten year professional career, which started at Torino he has netted just 85 goals. However. since arriving at Udinese in 2006 he has scored 56 of those goals in the following four seasons. While he has never been the kind of player relied upon to be a leading scorer, his natural talent has never been questioned. Juve team mate Simone Pepe said of him this week;
Then the injury crisis took full hold but rather than collapse, Juventus have seemingly grown, partly due to a desire to continue the early promise but also down to a slight alteration of the system. This was discussed in depth last week, but in summary Claudio Marchisio has been pressed into a mezzala role, tucking in from the left to form a midfield three. This has meant Quagliarella has been made to cover the left flank when Juve lose possession while Del Piero saves his energy alone up front.
Rather than curb his attacking prowess, Quagliarella has thrived in this more withdrawn role. A combination of not being made to play as a prima punta & arriving late into the penalty area has seen his scoring rate improve & he now has six goals in eleven games. The most surprising thing however is that of those six goals four are headers, showing a side to his game not previously seen.
This new found clinical streak - which also includes a simple close range goal for Italy - is largely due to a great sense of positioning inside the box which is most definitely a new addition to his game. The main feature of his play until now has been an uncanny ability of knowing where the goal is without looking, a trait shared among history’s best strikers.
Putting all that together sees him just two goals behind in the race for the Capocannoniere crown. If he maintains this start to life in Turin there is no doubt he is worth the option of €10.5m over three years that was agreed with Napoli in August. While a true goalscorer is undoubtedly required next summer, so far this season Fabio Quagliarella is proving to be the missing 'bomber’ in Juve’s arsenal.
http://iltifosi.tumblr.com/
Almost every assessment of Juventus this season seems at some point to reach the conclusion that the one thing the team is missing is that elusive “proper striker”. The absence of a line leading, goal-poaching, twenty five goal a season Capocannoniere challenger is deemed to be the missing piece in the Bianconeri jigsaw assembled by Beppe Marotta this summer.
Many match reviews, including those for the Bologna & Brescia games here on Il Tifosi have reached this same conclusion, with Giampaolo Pazzini & Edin Džeko offered as solutions. Plenty of other outlets tout names on a daily basis, seemingly on a rota basis as the rumour mill churns out the same players time after time. However the solution - until next summer at least - may well already be at the club.
Fabio Quagliarella is a much maligned striker. Often derided as a “playstation player” due to he propensity for scoring spectacular goals, he is viewed as an inconsistent, infuriating & unreliable player, the cliched 'scorer of great goals but not a great goal scorer’ line is often trotted out to describing him. Any search for him on YouTube will confirm this, any compilation of his goals looks like the results for a Goal of the Season compilation.
His career started slowly, & throughout his ten year professional career, which started at Torino he has netted just 85 goals. However. since arriving at Udinese in 2006 he has scored 56 of those goals in the following four seasons. While he has never been the kind of player relied upon to be a leading scorer, his natural talent has never been questioned. Juve team mate Simone Pepe said of him this week;
“Quagliarella is an incredible player. I would never think about taking a shot 50 meters out on the volley. He would. And it’d go in.”
Cup-tied in Europe due to an earlier appearance in the competition for home-town club Napoli, he has only been available in Serie A for Juventus. In his first few games he looked every bit the player described so far &, despite netting against former clubs Sampdoria & Udinese he was struggling to fit into Gigi Delneri’s 4-4-2. Injuries had forced Juve to field Quagliarella alongside Alessandro Del Piero & with no natural target man the team suffered.
Then the injury crisis took full hold but rather than collapse, Juventus have seemingly grown, partly due to a desire to continue the early promise but also down to a slight alteration of the system. This was discussed in depth last week, but in summary Claudio Marchisio has been pressed into a mezzala role, tucking in from the left to form a midfield three. This has meant Quagliarella has been made to cover the left flank when Juve lose possession while Del Piero saves his energy alone up front.
Rather than curb his attacking prowess, Quagliarella has thrived in this more withdrawn role. A combination of not being made to play as a prima punta & arriving late into the penalty area has seen his scoring rate improve & he now has six goals in eleven games. The most surprising thing however is that of those six goals four are headers, showing a side to his game not previously seen.
This new found clinical streak - which also includes a simple close range goal for Italy - is largely due to a great sense of positioning inside the box which is most definitely a new addition to his game. The main feature of his play until now has been an uncanny ability of knowing where the goal is without looking, a trait shared among history’s best strikers.
Putting all that together sees him just two goals behind in the race for the Capocannoniere crown. If he maintains this start to life in Turin there is no doubt he is worth the option of €10.5m over three years that was agreed with Napoli in August. While a true goalscorer is undoubtedly required next summer, so far this season Fabio Quagliarella is proving to be the missing 'bomber’ in Juve’s arsenal.
http://iltifosi.tumblr.com/
