Ranieri made it clear today that he really is deranged. He started De Ceglie at left-wing and Molinaro at left-back. Torino was putting 10 men behind the ball practically at all times during the first half, but they inept at shutting us down, which must have been scary for their manager. They allowed our central midfielders a lot of space, but Momo doesn't have the ability to do much with the ball apart from making terrible passes. After the break and the amazing individual effort by Amauri, Granata started to get more of the ball and took the game to us, causing some scary moments via crosses from the wing and chances from Abbruscatto and Rosina.
So what does Ranieri do? He subs off De Ceglie at 1-0 up for Giovinco, thus essentially contradicting his whole ploy at the beginning of the match to make sure the flank was secure defensively. Ranieri threw on Giovinco knowing that Torino would be pressing for the equalizing goal and we wouldn't have anywhere near the amount of possession we had prior to the Amauri stunner. Does this make any sense whatsoever? Knowing that we do not score much as it is, shouldn't we try to defend the lead? Wouldn't the plausible thing to do would be start with a more attacking formation via including Giovinco, thus allowing him to create against a team you knew would sit back, then tighten up the team by putting on a defensive winger? Everybody knows we have trouble scoring, so why start with a more defense-oriented formation only to end up bringing on such a weapon when we were trying to defend the lead? These decisions just don't make any sense. And yes, Ranieri is deranged.
But I'm certainly glad for the win and pleased to see that the team as a whole has improved. But we still have problems on our hands, including something so simple as completing passes.
Manninger - Was solid as usual. Very confident back there. 6.5
Grygera - Okay but wasn't tested much since we had more the ball. 5.5
Legrottaglie - Massive game for him, saved us on two occasions that would have been goals. 7
Chiellini - Decent game. 6.5
Molinaro - Better than usual but was shaky when Abate ran at it him a couple times. 6
Marchionni - Practically useless. 4.5
Sissoko - Great defensively but his passing was a nightmare. 5.5
Nedved - Did a good job but his movements while deep in midfield show that he's not a central midfielder. 6
De Ceglie - Good job coming back but didn't add much in that role. 5.5
Amauri - Beast of a player and won the game for us. 7
Del Piero - Off game 6
Mellberg - Did well I suppose. 6
Giovinco - Didn't see much of the ball because we didn't have as much of it. Not his fault. - 5.5
Iaquinta - N.A.