Forget about Bologna, Let us focus on winning this game so we can become Europe Champions after we reach the final.
Leicester's Kiernan Dewsbury-Hall and James Maddison question marks for Thursday https://t.co/BKtCMjzM5n— RomaPress (@ASRomaPress) May 3, 2022 We’ll see.
Getting the draw against Leicester away was a good result even if we're going to have to play a lot better to win this Thursday. Our main issue against Leicester in the first match is a similar one. We often tend to get pinned back and have no outlet to get out of our defensive shape. If your defense is all-world defenders who make only a few costly errors a complete season this can work. Ours isn't. A goal is usually coming if the other team is playing 75% of their passes around our goal. When we win the ball to "counter" or even just keep from giving opposition immediate possession back inside our half, our formation seems like a 7-0-3. Not just here and there which can and will happen but for entire 20 minute stretches of play. No midfielders are anywhere near the three attackers (Tammy, Zaniolo and Pellegrini in most cases) and these three are usually too spread out to even attempt to play off each other. This leads to a forward pass to Tammy or Zaniolo where they are marked by 2 defenders and the closest midfielder coming to clean up is also an opposing player. Other times it's not even clear what the other 2 attacking players were thinking/trying to do on counters when we actually do complete the long pass. One example among many is from the first Leicester match where Pellegrini flicked/dribbled past 2 defenders and carried the ball all the way to their penalty area. The camera angle showed half on the pitch and not one of our players ever entered into the camera frame. Needless to say this was Pellegrini carrying the ball down the flank not Afena-Gyan. I think Pellegini somehow won a counter one against three in that instance but if you're going to be dangerous on the counter, that's when you should be creating danger. We mainly take 10 seconds off the clock to exhaust our own player. Sometimes I'm not sure we seriously attempting to counter from deeper in our half? Our breakouts seems to be when we already have possession and the other team presses -- goal against Leicester came from a side throw in, Karsdorp I think, to Zaniolo who passed the great cross field ball) and all of our dangerous counters arise from when we press and win possession around midfield. Seems we can actually be decent enough creating dangerous attacks playing through pressure at times as long as it's from a dead ball and does not start with a defensive interception in our third. I know that one issue is that Patricio seems to be a very good shot stopper but pretty bad passing from the back, at east for us this year. (All in all though he's a solid addition mainly because of his attitude). Some of it is that neither Tammy nor Zaniolo really impress me in the least with their off the ball movement. I would expect Ibanez and Mancini to be looking clever passes out of our box when we win a ball but they seem pretty reticent to do more than boot it back unless we're completely "set up" after a dead ball or GK catch. I guess some of the answer will just be getting away from this back three next season (hopefully) and the added midfielder will solve a lot of issues. However, in the short term the main thing I watch for as a bell weather in our play is how often we win balls in the middle of the pitch (seriously this is the key in every single match we win pretty much regardless of anything else) and, if not, where are the other attacking players and midfield support when we play a forward ball.
https://romapress.net/radja-nainggo...ck-to-winning-enough-with-the-trophy-draught/ "We" What a guy. Miss him.
Naingollan had always felt like one of our adopted Romans alongside guys like Taddei. Football is cut-troat business, but in many cases selling such kind of players islike cutting your own troat, which is what happened to the team once we've ruined our midfield with that wholesale.
It will be a huge upset if we are to go through to the final. Leicester are quite rightly the huge favourites for this match, they deserve to be taking at least a 2-goal lead over. I really hope I am wrong..... But seeing how things are going. We should be happy if we do not get humiliated.
Separate your opinion from fact. Roma are the strong favs in all bookmakers @1/2 to go to the final. Both teams will face the same questions of how they will react in a full stadium for a chance in a final. Even if it's tinpot extra money grab competition, the atmosphere on the night will make it huge for the players. I would expect it to be very close, but Jose has the slight edge in terms of handing the occasion and saying the right things at just the right time.
Tactically, it will be interesting to see what Mourinho comes up with to win balls before we're pinned back with 7 defenders practically in our own box, negating much chance of countering if our CBs are going to be brave on the ball when they win it in our area and give time for midfielders to support the counter attack. We had trouble with Leicester's midfielders being quicker in the first leg and just getting dribbles or flicks to get around ours in the first leg. Prevented us from exploiting their own weaknesses defending. Adding Oliviera isn't ideal in this regard so I'll be curious to see the solution Jose proposes. Leicester is pretty good but, to me, no better than Lazio or Fiorentina. I think we're favorites for a reason but tactically have to figure out a way to consistently make them defend us getting numbers running at their goal this time around.
I am working from home this afternoon so I can watch this match. 3-0 Roma incoming. Azzurri and now Roma legend, Bryan Cristante, MOTM.
Enough with this full stadium nonsense. 70k fans can't do jack-s3*t.. In 2014 we got humiliated 7-1 by Bayren Munich, and the Olimpico was sold out.
You're partially right. I mean for a team like Roma, It's a great thing that we wasted our chances to qualify to CL by putting more emphasis on winning this Mickey Mouse trophy. This team belong here anyways.