Summer mercato thread 2017-18 (51 Viewers)

[Quetzalcoatl]

Most teams don't do just fine, they do just average.

Very good.

Let me rephrase: no other team had a defender who could play the ball out the back like Bonucci, yet they were not fucked

 

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[italiacalcio10]

Very good.

Let me rephrase: no other team had a defender who could play the ball out the back like Bonucci, yet they were not $#@!ed

We should be better defensively with Lichtsteiner & Rugani.
Bonucci and Alves are good creators but neither are great defensive players.

Bonucci is good defensively, but world class in distribution for a defender.
I'd say Rugani and Benatia are probably better man markers.

Lichtsteiner is certainly a better marker than Alves. If we can generate more chances through our upgrade on the wingers, and natural evolution of Dybala, we shouldn't miss them too much.

 

[DanielSz]

Marotta was pretty vague when he said closed cases for Keita and schick because right after he mentioned maybe an opportunity pops up.

If the relations with Atalanta are that good then this is just a case of waiting until they find a replacement rather than some standoff.

Why didn't anyone ask him about midfield

 

[Hydde]

We should be better defensively with Lichtsteiner & Rugani.
Bonucci and Alves are good creators but neither are great defensive players.

Bonucci is good defensively, but world class in distribution for a defender.
I'd say Rugani and Benatia are probably better man markers.

Lichtsteiner is certainly a better marker than Alves. If we can generate more chances through our upgrade on the wingers, and natural evolution of Dybala, we shouldn't miss them too much.

 

[pitbull]

Costa? Szeszny for 12m is a great deal. The disappointing thing is that we sold 2 key players, again.. but the purchases have been good.

I dislike Costa, I think we definitely overpaid there
The Pole is worth 12m, but what is he? Eternal back up? Buffons replacement? He's too expensive to always be a backup and I'm not confident replacing Buffon with someone clubs like Roma and Arsenal let go

 

[Collaguazo]

We should be better defensively with Lichtsteiner & Rugani.
Bonucci and Alves are good creators but neither are great defensive players.

Bonucci is good defensively, but world class in distribution for a defender.
I'd say Rugani and Benatia are probably better man markers.

Lichtsteiner is certainly a better marker than Alves. If we can generate more chances through our upgrade on the wingers, and natural evolution of Dybala, we shouldn't miss them too much.

With Bonucci I can agree but Lich isn't a better defender than Alves. Alves is simply a superior player and our RB is considerable weaker without him.

Alves might not be know for his defensive skill but the guy has good positioning, can tackle hard and knows a couple of dirty tricks to annoy attackers.

 

[GarfielD]

So, at the end, we are getting only Spina?

 

[Boksic]

Benatia a better man marker than Bonucci? Come on, no way. I'm as disappointed as anyone at Bonucci going and critical of his defending at times. But he is a far superior defender to Benatia and virtually every aspect apart from when a player is dribbling towards him.

No rational fan can say we aren't worse off without Bonucci and Alves.

I really like Rugani and still rate Licht more than most here, but we are weaker.

 

[Hust]

Bonucci is a great defender. Man-marking, one on ones...don't be morons.

Only thing frustrating about bonbon was the deflections turning into goals

Don't be butt hurt morons because he left. Guy is an amazing defender

 

[Dostoevsky]

Costa? Szeszny for 12m is a great deal. The disappointing thing is that we sold 2 key players, again.. but the purchases have been good.

I don't think Costa is going to turn out to be a good move but hopefully I'm wrong. I think he'll end up as a brainless runner, hit & chase. Annoying and frustrating to watch.

We want a formation with wingers yet they are not impressive. Surely not impressive enough for a CL finalist. Bernardeschi has yet to prove himsefl there, and it's not even his natural position, while Cuadrado is not good enough to be a starter.

 

[Collaguazo]

I never thought a CL finalist would purchase such players.

Bernardeschi is fine, though. Everything else seems chaotic. I guess I can digest Matuidi. But our team and current setup looks fragile and disappointing.



Squad is a lot weaker in my books.

It's unbalanced and the big picture is missing, we're making moves without any plan. Now, somebody will say how our staff knows the plan, but I highly doubt that.

And I don't expect much from the upcoming season.

That is what worries me the most; we didn't have a clear plan for this mercato.

We still have a strong team and we are in a position that is sustainable on the long term. Milan and Inter might have gotten better but their investors pull the plug and it's game over for them. They are a big question mark. We will continue to dominate Serie A, might not win it every time, but CL qualification is a given.

Unfortunately Europe still seems to be hit and miss and this is where our lack of planning is affecting us.

I understand that the management sees the necessity to sell in order to be sustainable or the "they want to leave BS" but we need better transition plans. We sold Alves and Vidal without first securing proper reinforcements and now we are scrambling in the mercato for a RB and just now with Matuidi you can argue we have a somewhat decent replacement for Vidal.

 

[Juliano13]

I don't think Costa is going to turn out to be a good move but hopefully I'm wrong. I think he'll end up as a brainless runner, hit & chase. Annoying and frustrating to watch.

We want a formation with wingers yet they are not impressive. Surely not impressive enough for a CL finalist. Bernardeschi has yet to prove himsefl there, and it's not even his natural position, while Cuadrado is not good enough to be a starter.

And yet we were CL finalists with even worse wingers.

 

[Dostoevsky]

That is what worries me the most; we didn't have a clear plan for this mercato.

We still have a strong team and we are in a position that is sustainable on the long term. Milan and Inter might have gotten better but their investors pull the plug and it's game over for them. They are a big question mark. We will continue to dominate Serie A, might not win it every time, but CL qualification is a given.

Unfortunately Europe still seems to be hit and miss and this is where our lack of planning is affecting us.

I understand that the management sees the necessity to sell in order to be sustainable or the "they want to leave BS" but we need better transition plans. We sold Alves and Vidal without first securing proper reinforcements and now we are scrambling in the mercato for a RB and just now with Matuidi you can argue we have a somewhat decent replacement for Vidal.

We've gotten weaker IMO. Last year we had an impressive run and yet we had Roma/Napoli on our back the whole time. It's going to be tough, not only to motivate and win, but to 'fix' our defense and literally fit 2 new players into our backline after years of having the same players infront of Gigi. It's going to be tough this year to win Serie A IMO, despite the 'weak' competition.

As for Europe, I actually have no hope for higher stages simply because it's impossible to win while relying on De Sciglio. Benatia not being himself isn't helping either, while I don't find our forward line well planned as we're playing 2 out of 3 players out of position (Dybala and Berna) while Costa seems like a brainless runner.

Not just that, but we also bought Matuidi who doesn't fit well into a 2man midfield.

It's like we forced buys this summer just for the sake of it.

- - - Updated - - -

And yet we were CL finalists with even worse wingers.

But with more balanced squad. Much more.

 

[juve123]

Our net spending in last two mercato is 38 million euros

 

[MikeM]

I actually think we had way, way more of a plan this year than maybe even the last 2 years. Clearly we were going for 4-2-3-1 and clearly we went for 2 wingers straight away with Costa and Bernardeschi.

Benatia and Rugani were always brought in to replace a CB eventually, it just happened to be Bonucci. Personally, I prefer to let Rugani play as much as possible so a Bonucci replacement is not a big deal for me.

And we were never going to buy multiple CMs for this formation. It only requires 4 or 5 and we already had Pjanic, Marchisio, Khedira, (Bentancur emerged). So signing Matuidi is not exactly a Hernanes style panic signing. It's somewhat logical. Especially when he is a straight swap with Lemina/Rincon.

The only real glaring hole we've neglected is RB. But that hole is only huge because Alves went on a tear at the end of last season. But people forget we played without him for a good portion of last year.

We didn't even have a formation at the start of last season. We settled on 4-2-3-1 after a few months. Look at our bench attacking options last year: Cuadrado, Lemina, Sturaro and Kean....

 

[Dostoevsky]

I actually think we had way, way more of a plan this year than maybe even the last 2 years. Clearly we were going for 4-2-3-1 and clearly we went for 2 wingers straight away with Costa and Bernardeschi.

Benatia and Rugani were always brought in to replace a CB eventually, it just happened to be Bonucci. Personally, I prefer to let Rugani play as much as possible so a Bonucci replacement is not a big deal for me.

And we were never going to buy multiple CMs for this formation. It only requires 4 or 5 and we already had Pjanic, Marchisio, Khedira, (Bentancur emerged). So signing Matuidi is not exactly a Hernanes style panic signing. It's somewhat logical. Especially when he is a straight swap with Lemina/Rincon.

The only real glaring hole we've neglected is RB. But that hole is only huge because Alves went on a tear at the end of last season. But people forget we played without him for a good portion of last year.

We didn't even have a formation at the start of last season. We settled on 4-2-3-1 after a few months. Look at our bench attacking options last year: Cuadrado, Lemina, Sturaro and Kean....

But Bernardeschi is more of an AMC than a winger. Dybala is also more of a CF/SS than AMC.

Signing Matuidi does make sense, but playing him next to Pjanic in a 2 man midfield doesn't make much sense.

And it's De Sciglio who's getting the spot. De Sciglio! lol that's just unreal. So we're changing 50% of our defense this year which is a huge deal. Yes, our bench did suck last year, but we didn't have injuries so the impact was minimal.

 

[Collaguazo]

Bonucci is a great defender. Man-marking, one on ones...don't be morons.

Only thing frustrating about bonbon was the deflections turning into goals

Don't be butt hurt morons because he left. Guy is an amazing defender

He is an amazing defender but for me his biggest weakness was one on ones and I rate Rugani better in that aspect and even a slowing down Barzagli.

Bonucci had an excelent ability to read the game and that's why his best position was as sweeper in a 3 man defense. His interceptions to get the ball were impecable. However he did struggle a bit in a 4 man defense and dealing with man marking. We all know his famous stretching-the-leg move to stop an incoming attacker

 

[GarfielD]

How much did Kalinic cost Milan? Why didnt we went after him?

 

[MikeM]

But Bernardeschi is more of an AMC than a winger. Dybala is also more of a CF/SS than AMC.

Signing Matuidi does make sense, but playing him next to Pjanic in a 2 man midfield doesn't make much sense.

And it's De Sciglio who's getting the spot. De Sciglio! lol that's just unreal. So we're changing 50% of our defense this year which is a huge deal. Yes, our bench did suck last year, but we didn't have injuries so the impact was minimal.

Well we can debate the merits of the actual players we've signed, of course. But I just think our board was trying to fill spaces for the formation, which is more than we could have said in the past. Surely last year Allegri was left to figure it out for himself.

Bernardeschi, whether he's a winger or a AMC, still fills the requirement of providing a backup option to Dybala or a winger, of which last year we had none of either lol.

Allegri has always said he wants to put more emphasis on attack and our first 2 signings were attackers so I think our plan was clear. Again, we can debate the merits of who they actually signed but IMO we had no plan last year.

 

[Collaguazo]

I conclusion we have to lit a couple of candles for la Virgen de Guadalupe and pray for the best