Juventus is a hardworking team. Whenever Tevez went missing last season someone else would step in. From all over the pitch. We'll be fine. Mandzukic is an awesome, hardworking, quality CF. When Bayern spanked us in 2013 I was salivating at the thought of having him wear the Juve jersey. I still can't believe we've signed him.
There were quite a number of members of this forum, including those now labelling our mercato crap, who were all up in arms that we didn't go for Mandzukic last summer, and saying how Atletico got him for a super great deal at 22 mil, and we got super ripped off buying Morata for basically the same price...
How their stories have changed now...
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I've been wrong about a few players just like everybody else has. But I'm not going to claim Mandzukic is a top ten forward when he obviously isn't. I never even said he wasn't a good player, I like him.
Well, I guess I went a little over the top then. I certainly agree with everything you say here. I rate Mandzukic as just outside the top 10. In the same place with guys like Higuain. Somewhere between 10-15... I feel, as far as forwards go, there' 4-5 a cut above the rest in Messi, Ronaldo, Suarez, Neymar, Zlatan... Then you have another group of 5 with Cavani, Benzema, Costa, Aguero, Tevez. And then perhaps a group of 8-12 behind them... a guy like Mandzukic because of his consistency in scoring and toughness and hardwork... A guy like Higuain because his pure nose for goal. I'd put guys like Van Persie and Falcao in the lower half of this group, because of poor recent seasons, age, and the uncertainty about their futures. Young forwards who are starting to realize potential would go in there too in the lower half. In that group of 8-12 would be Muller, Mandzukic, Higuain, Lacazette, Morata, Falcao, Bacca, Dzeko, Van Persie, Martinez, Benteke, Kane, Lukaku... This would probably be about the order I'd rate them in as of now too.
I just consider at least those first three in Muller, Mandzukic, Higuain top players, even if they aren't quite in that top 10 group.
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Let's hope we don't catch him at the bad end of his bell curve
Great posts today by the way. Pretty much what I'm thinking you
just say it better
I'm worried about the same thing with Mandzukic, after seeing how quickly Llorente's form went down the toilet. However, I do think Mandzukic offers much much more than Llorente in general play if he's not scoring. So there's that. At the very least he's going to work his ass off, even if his scoring boots go missing at times. Hopefully they don't.
And thank you.

I think a few of us understand how exciting it is to see this rejuvenated and much more youthful Juventus being built as the cycle ends for our 4 straight scudetti winning core. We were an ancient team the last two years, our average age was crazy high. I'm glad our management saw this and started last summer with Morata, Pereyra, COman, and now continued that this summer with Rugani, Dybala, Zaza, and hopefully they get their CAM. Berardi next year too. We may see some growing pains, but this squad looks like it has a very promising future. Our little "optimistic" group goes a little overboard with enthusiasm for Beppe and our new signings at times, but that's just the nature of being excited about new players coming into our team. I really hope I never turn into a super pessimistic, grumpy fan of Juve who literally complains about everything Juventus does. It wouldn't even be fun being a fan anymore.
I'm sorry if I directed any of my post-CL final meltdown your way. I was pretty damn disappointed in those first couple days after. Exhausted from work, and so ridiculously disappointed.