He also took 13 shots over these two matches and scored just twice, one of which was a pk that was only given to make up for the Betancur penalty. The thing about having him on your team is you live and die with his performance, he commands the most respect on the field due to his career accomplishments and his ability.. this summer is the last chance juve have to recoup any of the money spent on him and the entire midfield and fullbacks need replacing
So after being eliminated from the first round of CL, Sarri says that he expected less and that it was a great performance? I am in awe of his ability to judge the situation.
We are worse in CL with Ronaldo. 2013-2018 (exception of 2014) we lost to Bayern, RM, Barca With CR, we lost to Ajax and Lyon...literally the easiest draws we ever got. Agnelli cut off the balls of this team, there is 0 chemistry all over the pitch and thats why we lose. he wasted 2 good yrs of Ronaldo
All I must say is that Sarri needs to go. Bring back Allegri, please! He is at least decent and doesn't lose to teams like Lyon.
Sarri is gone, Pochettino is the most rumored replacement though Agnelli's preferred candidate is Zidane
I ride with the Chairman on this one. Poch is another Sarri. Never won anything and although he grew up a fan, does not really understand the club. Zizou does.
I also lean toward someone like Zidane. This club needs a proven winner and someone who can inspire the players. It helps to know the club culture. Short of someone like Pep, I would lean toward a Zidane or Deschamps. Were Ancellotti available, he wouldn't be bad but for the fact he has said he didn't like his time here.
Pirlo officially our new coach. What do you think guys? I personally feel that this is being very adventurous but sometimes new coaches without so much experience is the better way to go I feel. Inexperienced coaches tend to be more flexible and try out different things, while too many experienced coaches are stuck on their ways and philosophy and can get very stubborn at times.
I know but when we played against Ajax we had many injuries. Allegri is not our best choice, but I was basically saying that I'd rather have Allegri than Sarri. Also we didn't need to beat Young Boys anyway. We already were in the Round of 16. Ajax was the key loss. At least we were playing better under him though.
I think that lampards success has breathed life into elite players being considered to coach, gattuso has had a revival over at Napoli who look good under him and ibra is basically serving at assistant coach at Milan, certain players just command respect and players will be more willing to look up to them or suffer under them, pep and zidane obviously are the peak of this genre of coaches but they are the outliers... contrast that with guys like mourinos moodiness and ego which was traded for oles slow and steady wins the race philosophy in which United look better and guys like martial, pogba, rashford are performing more consistently under ole, a former player.
This does appear to be a trend, but I would have liked for him to get a couple years under his belt first. Hope it works. We should see better football anyway. Now it is up too Paratici to supply Pirlo with the players to make this team younger, faster, more skillful and HUNGRY AGAIN.
Hi, everyone. It's been about a year since I was last in here. I've been busy -- working two jobs, getting my life insurance license, etc... Not to mention the life-altering phenomenon known as the pandemic. Juventus almost pulled off another Champions league miracle yesterday. I have to say though that had we managed to knock Lyon out of the competition, it is highly unlikely that we would have gone on to win it. For quite some time, this squad has looked unbalanced and disjointed. Real chemistry has been lacking. You can get away with relying on the individual brilliance of Ronaldo and Dybala over the course of a tenth-month, 38-game season. In order to win the Champions League, you need an element of luck as a well as a cohesive unit. A team is a cohesive unit wherein the whole is greater than the sum of its parts. Manchester City, Bayern, PSG, Atletico, and Barca are ahead of us where that's concerned. Also, the cruel reality of the competition, as Sarri pointed out his post-game interview, is that you can play very well only to have bad luck, poor finishing, and dodgy refereeing conspire to eliminate you. I was not a fan of Sarri, but I don't think he's the one to blame for this. Agnelli and others in the front office need to go back and design a team which is solid in midfield and defense. Those were our problem areas this season. At times, a lot of the players gave the impression that they unsure of their roles on the pitch. Something is broken. We're running out of time to make the most of Ronaldo's still-very-impressive form. I meant to make this post earlier. In the time that I have been dithering, we've sacked Sarri and incredibly replaced him with Andrea Pirlo! Sarri wasn't given the kind of players he wanted in order to play his brand of football. He was an easy scapegoat. Personally, I wanted either Simone Inzaghi or Zidane to take over. Inzaghi would have been the more realistic option since he has prior Serie A management experience. His Lazio team have been playing some of the most modern, progressive football in Europe these last few years. Zidane would have commanded an enormous salary, and Real Madrid would have been reluctant to let him leave. Do you guys foresee a revolution under Pirlo in terms of personnel or playing style?
Feels like a rerun of last year. Juve start out very strong with all their stars healthy and in form. However, as the season progresses, injuries and long absences result in declining league form and a CL elimination with a tired, injured, and out of form squad. Last year Juve missed, Mandzukic, Costa, and Dybala for one, both, or most of the 2 legs vs Ajax. This year they were without Dybala and Costa. The team is too reliant on Ronaldo in attack because their other forwards have been physically unreliable by the end of these long seasons. In defense, Juve have had to rely on Cuadrado and Sandro playing all season with little rotation (especailly Sandro). Chiellini has been hurt for two CL KO eliminations as well. Demiral obviously being out didn't help when Juve were leaking goals with Rugani since returning. When Juve are playing at a world class level, it has been because these two facets of the team are carrying a solid but unspectacular midfield. Allegri was criticized last year because he sat back and absorbed pressure too much and that is why they lost. Say what you will of Sarri, in these two matches vs Lyon, Juve were playing a very high line and trying to play in Lyon's field. If the best players on the team aren't physically available to play two legs, it doesn't matter who the coach is.
We got unlucky this year with our main two defenders getting injured, that is one of the main reasons we gave up so many goals, Chiellini getting hurt, then Demiral getting hurt was very bad, before getting hurt Demiral was playing very well. I do give props to Sandro and Cuadrado always being available, they have been the most durable players on this team with Ronaldo. Bentancur has been there too, he just needs to improve, if he doesn’t have a breakout year this upcoming year it’s time to ship him off.
Bentancur makes a lot of stupid decisions in dangerous areas. He needs to improve that portion of his game
Yep, and the amount of hard fouls he keeps making puts us in bad situations. Only Pirlo can help a young MF do better and hope he does because if Pirlo can’t help him then no one can and he can be on his way out of Juve after next season.
I would be pretty shocked if Bayern do not win the Champions League. They look terrifyingly good. No weakness outside of Lewandowski being their only proven 9. If he goes down, they will be in trouble. If he is healthy, it is there title to lose.
You make a valid point. Obviously, at this point, winning the Champions League should be our priority for 2020-21. I wouldn't mind a 10th consecutive scudetto, just for the sake of bragging rights. It's hard to believe that we're this close to pulling off such an improbable feat. That level of domestic dominance is something one generally associates with clubs from the 50's, 60's, 70's, and maybe the the 80's. I never thought when we won the first of these way back in 2012 that our hegemony would be so be pronounced. Over the last few years, we have been unlucky with injuries at crucial stages of the season. That's the thing about the Champions League -- the stars really do have to align to give you a chance of winning it. Like Sarri said in Friday's post-elimination interview, our record in the competition this season was stellar. We lost at the wrong time, and we were history. Let's hope we can get the rub of the green next season...
Even though on paper they look to be stronger than Barca, I wouldn't at all be surprised if the Catalans knock them out. I doubt they will be allowed to play their free-flowing football. Messi is the man for these types of occasions. I see him guiding Barca to victory...
On paper they are superior as well as with the eye test. At least in my opinion. I thought Barca were uncomfortable even against Napoli and Bayern put 7 past Chelsea. At the end of the day, they are one off games, so anything can happen from here on out. Hell, Atalanta or Leipzig could surprise everyone!
The CL is simultaneously a great and awful competition. Luck just plays too much of a role. Obviously for the most part great teams win the competition and often the best team. This Juve were not that, but it's a shame that they were injured and out of form for another year. This does highlight the problem with relying on Mandzukic, Chiellini, Costa, and Khedira (yes Juve's record with him in the CL is much better than with Bentancur for example) is that they were/are injury prone and aging. After multiple deep runs and summer tournaments over the years, it's not possible for players to keep going at that pace. As for Dybala, he had a great season but this was yet another year where he wasn't physically fit in the CL KOs. Vs Madrid two years ago, he had yet returned from injury. Vs Ajax, he played 1 out of 4 halves due to injury. We saw what happened last week. Juve desperately need another 15-25 goal scorer to replace Dybala's production should he go down next year. Ronaldo can't do it on his own. Although Sarri didn't elevate the squad, given the options available to him on the night, this elimination comes down to all the above factors. It didn't help that despite all that, Juve's finishing let them down. Could easily have been 3-1 or 4-1 on the night.