It's just not an Allegro thing. This is what Italian teams are/were known for.
I mean Conte played for a draw against an inferior Benfica side in a semi-final of a European competition ffs
If you overdo pragmatism in CL these days, chances are you are more likely to get punished.
not only italians. when you're down to 10 cause your goalie just got a red, your first sub is an attacker off for the goalie 99% of the time. then you'll see how the game develops. max, mourinho, tuchel and most pragmatic coaches would park the bus and get a point if lucky. the other end of the spectrum is the romantic naive hipster like ange who played with an extremely high line even with 2 men down against chelsea and got punished and also ridiculed
motta gambled well withi his moderate approach and got lucky too as leipzig had multiple chances to score. it was a great game other than the catastrophic refereeing and bremer's injury, and a proper team effort at that too. motta fully deserves the praise. but it still could have gone either way and even if we'd lost the game i wouldn't blame it on him. we didn't really get countered, we kept on pressing, but not with a very high line. that was a safe and brave approach at the same time