Go look at all the times we’ve been naive in big games. Trying to press high with Khedira and Pjanic in midfield, trying to play on the counter with Mandzukic on the wing. Subbing Morata off against Bayern which killed our attacking threat. Keeping Pirlo on for the entire final when he was clearly a passenger.
Allegri hasn’t just been naive against superior opposition, look at how badly he managed the supercoppa against Lazio or the game against Tottenham last week.
Would Sarri have done better or worse in those situations? Nobody knows. He’s currently doing an amazing job with a decent team. That’s all we know.
I wouldn't call us naive it's not our approach that was the problem; our midfield was weak in Cardiff, it let us down and we were gassed. We did brought the game to them otherwise. Subbing out Morata against Bayern was a bad decision, too conservative I agree, same thing for keeping Pirlo.
Allegri is the opposite of naive, the opposite of a dreamer, he can be too conservative at times.
I'll say this much, I don't like how we don't play a full game worth of intensity and concentration.
I wouldn't call us naive it's not our approach that was the problem; our midfield was weak in Cardiff, it let us down and we were gassed. We did brought the game to them otherwise. Subbing out Morata against Bayern was a bad decision, too conservative I agree, same thing for Pirlo.
Allegri is the opposite of naive, the opposite of a dreamer, he can be too conservative at times.
Morata was gassed in that match unfortunately. His last counterattack before he was sub'd off he basically ran out of steam and couldn't run anymore, getting closed down and putting a weak shot towards goal. And with good reason, both he and Cuadrado ran their asses off that match.
Allegri's terrible decision in that match was putting a half-fit Mandzukic (returning from injury) on the pitch for Morata, instead of Zaza who was scoring for fun in his appearances that season for us, and could have easily kept our counterattacking outlet going being in form and in shape. Morata needed to come off, but Allegri made a terrible choice as his sub.
And absolutely no one wanted Allegri here, coming from Milan. With very few exceptions, everyone thought he would be shit, and our dominance in the league was even going to end. Hardly a selling point. Allegri surprised. This doesn't mean Sarri will surprise too.
I've said many time I think Sarri is a good coach. But at this point in time there is absolutely nothing but presumption and wild speculation to suggest he's superior to Allegri. He could turn out to be superior one day, but at this point, he has nothing to show. His cabinet is bare, and he's 10 years older than Allegri. He has a lot of catching up to do to even be mentioned alongside Allegri.
And absolutely no one wanted Allegri here, coming from Milan. With very few exceptions, everyone thought he would be shit, and our dominance in the league was even going to end. Hardly a selling point. Allegri surprised. This doesn't mean Sarri will surprise too.
I've said many time I think Sarri is a good coach. But at this point in time there is absolutely nothing but presumption and wild speculation to suggest he's superior to Allegri. He could turn out to be superior one day, but at this point, he has nothing to show. His cabinet is bare, and he's 10 years older than Allegri. He has a lot of catching up to do to even be mentioned alongside Allegri.
I think hes a great coach but pointing to europe as the objective for us and saying a guy that has never won anything and fails in europe pretty bad is a bold statement
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I understand that you dont like his style but its extremely effective. I still would like you to name a coach who could have getten better results with our players? Zidane? Pep couldnt do it with Bayern. Are they not as talented of a team than ours?
I get it....I would love to be able to buy the type of players Madrid does. Have Bale and Isco and James type players coming off the bench but thats not where we stand as a club with our without max.
Saying our style is boring and whatever is fine but saying we underperform is one of the dumbest things ive heard in quite some time
As I said we are limited with our tactics against the bigger teams
We play a super defensive game and conceded 7 goals in 2 CL finals
Saying defence is effective is not true when it comes to winning a CL
Twice it has backfired on us where we conceded an unusual high amount of goals in the most important game
The team who attacks with the ball can not concede
Not being afraid to push players forward and impose ourselves on opponents will benefit us much more than parking the bus and having no outlet to break away and relieve the pressure
We are not playing with bums in the team we have good players
Being passive and always reacting to the opponent especially opponents with real.quality is not the answer to.besting them in a final
Attack wins you CL titles these days not defence it's been proven over the last few years that the team who plays to score not to concede generally wins the CL
I repeat 7 goals in 2 finals, clearly Allegri's tactics are wrong for the final
I disagree with the idea that we parked the bus in both finals. We clearly tried to attack, but we were simply outclassed. We got outclassed probably more than we should have because Allegri made tactical mistakes in both finals.
The problem is that we simply suck at attacking. We aren’t comfortable at playing an attacking game. We get gassed very easily and then just bunker in our own half.
I refuse to believe that this is just because of our players when inferior teams to us do a better job of attacking the elite teams. This problem is on Max.
I disagree with the idea that we parked the bus in both finals. We clearly tried to attack, but we were simply outclassed. We got outclassed probably more than we should have because Allegri made tactical mistakes in both finals.
The problem is that we simply suck at attacking. We aren’t comfortable at playing an attacking game. We get gassed very easily and then just bunker in our own half.
I refuse to believe that this is just because of our players when inferior teams to us do a better job of attacking the elite teams. This problem is on Max.
Agreed except on the tactical mistakes bit, but this is on the coach. Probably on the fitness trainer as well, it's not normal the team can't play for 90 minutes.
In terms of results, very hard for anyone to do what he did. 3 doubles and 2 CL finals is simply fantastic. But the style in which we got those great results leaves a lot to be desired.
Now you are probably thinking "who cares about style, the result is all that matters". In some sense yes. Very few people would want Zeman here even if it meant super attacking football. But thats because Zeman means ZERO results.
The ideal state would be a balance between those two variables: Style & Results. Allegri scores low on style and high on results. Zeman is high on style bet a big nothing on results.
We are all familiar with some of the arguments favoring results over style.
1) Its the Juve way as a tradition to favor results even if it mean style is totally sacrified (compared to say Barca or Arsenal's tradition).
2) 10 years from now, no one will remember an attractive team that didnt win. History ultimately only remembers the winners. And finalists over semi-finalists.
3) You make more money in the CL the more you advance. Finalist Juve makes a few mills more than semi-finalist Juve.
Are there any strong arguments for style over results? I think there is and you might get the intuition for it if I asked you whether you'd rather Juve reached two semis instead of two finals but done so playing very attractive football in Serie A & in the CL upto that point. I am leaning towards a yes tbh.
I would take an attractive say Pep style Juve and exit in the semis over the current Juve which has better results. Why?
1) Entertainment value for myself. I'd be enjoying matches a lot more.
2) Entertainment value and appeal to new fans. I think we would be more popular as a club and make more money if we played attractive football.
Think of the fact that we are a team that won two doubles and reached 2 finals and yet very VERY rarely you'll see ay of the big football sites sharing videos of our goals, and very very rarely famous pundits talk about any of our players. If you look at Bleacher report, ESPN, Bein Sports and other giant english speaking broadcasters, they consistently share goals and golazos from teams like City, Pool, Madrid, Barca, PSG and Bayern (most of which dont match our results at all). You'll see them sharing anything about juve once in a blue moon because we rarely give them something worth sharing. They used to share some pogba screamers and the occasional dybala screamer now but thats about it. They arent being paid to share that (though some certainly are), but they have a natural incentive to share beautiful goals or movements because that means more clicks and more engagement with their page and so on.
If we are gonna compete with the richer clubs in the long term, we need to get rich ourselves. And so far I fear despite great results, our fanbase isnt growing as fast as it could be if we had a more attractive style.
I want to see a new coach who can have good style and win things. If Sarri beats us to the league this season then tbh this should qualify him to manage a club of our size for sure.
Nice post, pretty much sums up what i think about allegri. No trolling, no sarcasm. All true.
In summary, i dont think we are demanding tiki taka or the likes. Juventus has an identity and all that is fine... but also it cannot be denied that we are playing too grindy and this team can do more.
Some say we need more money and that allegri is handtied.. but this is not totally true. When Marchisio can play, but you insist playing with Khedira, then theres room to improve. When u can play Berna as Midfielder to avoid playing khedira but dont do it,,, then theres room for improvement.
We play way too defensively even against opposition weaker than us. We simply struugle..we are uncomfort when needing to play offensive football and dominate..and this way we will never win the CL ...or at least we will need 5 finals to win one, when we can win 3 from 5 by playing a good balanced offensive/defensive game.
For example... i enjoyed allegri´s first season. We had a good combination of defensive and offensive game. We were mainly defensive..but we had players who could counter and our transition was much better. The last 2 years we have regressed. We have had offensive players come to our ranks liek coman and Pjaca... and to no avail. we havent used them much. Now Bernardeschi is the current example..getting few minutes. Luckily this is changing but you know what i mean. We brought Costa to have more variety on the wing... but we insist in using mandzukic as a winger when he is just not good anymore in that position.
Those kind of things are annoying.
PD: And stop talking about sarri. I like his football style, ill not deny it... but to coach juve is one thing and to coach napoli is another. He could be doing good in serie A, but as a man manager and as a coach who needs european pedigree...he is just not up to it.
Sarri is doing an amazing job losing in Europe and Cups to Shaktar, Feyenoord, RB Leipzig, Villarreal, Atalanta, Inter, etc in his time at Napoli. All those powerhouses with clearly superior squads and spending power to Napoli. How could anyone ever ask Sarri to compete with such mightiness.
He is throwing them intentionally if you havent noticed. Basically saving it all up to continue going neck to neck with us in the league. Could definitely back fire badly. Maybe its wiser to go all in on the Europa league and be happy with 2nd place in Italy like UTD did in the EPL towards last season.
But if he wins the league, then its a legendary season for Napoli. Biggest achievement since Maradona. You gotta see the appeal of this for a club their size.
And more excuses for Sarri sucking balls for 3 straight seasons in every competition not called Serie A. He threw the CL group stage by playing his best available XI? So he could go into the even more annoying Europa League? Right... I'm sure that is just what Napoli and Sarri wanted.
Or perhaps he just massively screwed up in the CL group stage and failed badly. Seems a little more likely, especially considering going through to Rof16 would be the exact same number of matches to play as crashing out with his pathetic and naive style into Europa Rof32. Even more so looking at the huge cash infusion getting into the CL knockouts would have provided.
Continue with excuses for his failures though. They are entertaining.
Nice post, pretty much sums up what i think about allegri. No trolling, no sarcasm. All true.
In summary, i dont think we are demanding tiki taka or the likes. Juventus has an identity and all that is fine... but also it cannot be denied that we are playing too grindy and this team can do more.
I agree. I’m not demanding that we play tiki taka football either. That would be against the identity of Juventus. It would be nice if we could play like how we played under Lippi. Direct football where we attack with purpose. Ferguson’s United had a similar philosophy. They were very attacking but not a possession team, they were just very direct and would open up defences quickly with 2-3 passes.
We have the players to play like this, but we don’t. This is partially because Allegri doesn’t want us to (or he doesn’t know how to coach this kind of football), and partially because our fitness coaches probably suck (we get tired very easily).
Agreed except on the tactical mistakes bit, but this is on the coach. Probably on the fitness trainer as well, it's not normal the team can't play for 90 minutes.
Yeah, but he's really punching above weight in Serie A, if they win it I don't think neapolitans will mind deliberate Coppa Italia or EL exits or mourn over shitty CL group stage. If they don't though, they might fall apart as many of their players are really underpaid and they won't be able to offer them the wages they'd get elsewhere.
It'd be like Allegri putting all of his eggs in Champions League, if we win the CL our fans would be ecstatic and Allegri would definitely be considered one of the greatest Juve coaches of all time. No one would care if we finished 2nd in Serie A or lost the Coppa, well at least I wouldn't.
And more excuses for Sarri sucking balls for 3 straight seasons in every competition not called Serie A. He threw the CL group stage by playing his best available XI? So he could go into the even more annoying Europa League? Right... I'm sure that is just what Napoli and Sarri wanted.
Or perhaps he just massively screwed up in the CL group stage and failed badly. Seems a little more likely, especially considering going through to Rof16 would be the exact same number of matches to play as crashing out with his pathetic and naive style into Europa Rof32. Even more so looking at the huge cash infusion getting into the CL knockouts would have provided.
Continue with excuses for his failures though. They are entertaining.
You have a valid point about the CL. They should have been able to get out of the group stage especially that it was an easy group this year and his team selection showed that they took it seriously and failed. The point doesn't carry over to the Europa League and Coppa though.
I am personally not hung up on Sarri though he is a candidate I'd consider especially if he wins Serie A. Napoli beating this Juve to the title is an achievement any way you look at it. He'd have proven he can win with his style despite having limited resources. I honestly dont think they can do it. They still have to play Roma, Inter, Milan and have a head to head with us. All we need is for them to drop points once and they will settle for second.
Whats your view on the point I made earlier about results vs style. Would you sacrifice some results (lets say missing out on Coppa Italia and exiting in the semis instead of the CL final) to see a good improvement in style?
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