Calcio Saga 19/20

Smalling and Mancini coming through big time.

Great times for Roma, a changed double pivot and still the game doesn't suffer much.

Lorenzo Pellegrini back from injury and dominating the game. Zaniolo scoring. Positive day for @McLewis

Robespierre wrote:

rincon wrote:

Robespierre wrote:We have made a fantastic victory but I can't be glad at all because so worried for Barella' s injury

knee surgery for Barella

At the end I can't complain  it ... I feared something serious (cruciate. I mean same as  Chiellini) , but it should be 1 month - 1 month and half
Well good also for Nazionale, we are going to win Euro 2020 aren't we

Indeed I was fearing for the nazionale but it's not so bad. It's happening

Smalling has been superb in Roma and it was not hard to predict this given his initial talent at United under SAF and clearly a change of environment and confidence given to him has brought it out again.

Pellegrini looked wonderful today despite back from a lengthy injury whilst Zaniolo is continuing to prove he is a legit talent to look out for. Glad to see Dzeko on the scoresheet as well.

chad4401 wrote:

Arquitecto wrote:

chad4401 wrote:Higuain and dybala to keep cr on the bench?

Cristiano is injured Chad and we know it will not happen anyway but if Madrid do recall Higuain due to his short contract then on his return he will bench Benzema most likely and most probably outperform him too.

Benzema is better than higuain everyday of the week have a sit and enjoy benzema scoring game after game, it's clearly killing in you inside.

Brescia were quite  legit under Corini, squad is  very poor on defence ( you can save nothing), good midfield (Tonali is one of most interesting young players, Bisoli is good .. but they 've lost Dessena because of an injury) attack is inconsistent because you don't know how Balotelli turns. and he turns badly now.
But they had good ideas under Corini.
Sacked from Cellino and signed Grosso, the WC 06 hero who is a terrible coach though .
This man was capable to perform badly even in Serie B under Bari and Verona (squads built for getting a promotion) , how could him be decent for Serie A ?
Brescia are the worst team atm for this reason ... Having said that Smalling and Mancini are doing very good and it was not so expected for me.
I didn't rate Mancini at Atalanta, I believed he was the typical defender developed from Gasperini system and overrated for his goals ... but he is defending good too and he was so useful to play in midfield too.
Smalling even better, who'd have said this ...
Sold Manolas who is not even a starter to Napoli now ( another surprise, negative in this case ) and signed 2 defenders (Smalling on loan, but I think he will stay) in his place. Good deal.

Yeah good win for us today. The 1st half was a nervy one as Brescia were holding firm to Grosso's tactics, but we upped the tempo in the 2nd and the inevitable miscue occurred. Frankly, they had some good looks in that 1st half were very unlucky not to have had at least a goal for their effort today.

As for us, I honestly thought Pellegrini looked a bit rusty and Zaniolo wasn't at all involved in that first half. Whatever Fonseca said to them at halftime transformed them into the players we've gotten to know. Smalling has been phenomenal and if he keeps playing like this, the 20m United want for him might end up a bargain. I wouldn't be surprised if they raise his price just to guarantee he comes back to them. Mancini has equally been great this season as well. For me, the player I was most happy to see playing well again was Florenzi. Admittedly, Brescia didn't have a player that could really get at him today, but he was our best player in 1st half and remained solid in the 2nd, but had to come off with a knock to his ankle.

Lots of news has been made about Pallotta potentially selling the club to another American, Dan Friedkin, but it was good to see the guys focusing on the football and not what is going on off the pitch. We needed those 3 points badly.

I love that Nainggolan is back to his Roma best at Cagliari. Just scored now at Lecce again.

7 points above Napoli if the results holds. CL spot. Unbeaten since matchday 3. Wonderful first half of the season form them.

We deserve all the banter if Cagliari make the CL with Olsen after how we treated him. That redemption arc is as tasty as Radja's tbh.

Allan gets a 200 000€ fine
-25% of monthly salary for everyone else
Koulibaly put on transfer market

ADL is a wannabe dictator that nobody truly respects, he's a mad man and this will destroy everything he built these last 5 years. I certainly won't complain... would swap Rabiot for Allan

Only Fabian Ruiz and Malcuit are safe apparently

For the rest Napoli is expected to flood the next 2 transfer windows with talented players... probably at discount price. Many clubs can make good business there

Warrior wrote:Allan gets a 200 000€ fine
-25% of monthly salary for everyone else
Koulibaly put on transfer market

ADL is a wannabe dictator that nobody truly respects, he's a mad man and this will destroy everything he built these last 5 years. I certainly won't complain... would swap Rabiot for Allan

Would swap anyone but Pjanic with Allan. Looks like ADL finally brought his clown persona to his club management.

McLewis wrote:We deserve all the banter if Cagliari make the CL with Olsen after how we treated him. That redemption arc is as tasty as Radja's tbh.

Nothing wrong with Roma there, we are talking about the 2nd GK of Cagliari. He just isn't good enough.

rincon wrote:

McLewis wrote:We deserve all the banter if Cagliari make the CL with Olsen after how we treated him. That redemption arc is as tasty as Radja's tbh.

Nothing wrong with Roma there, we are talking about the 2nd GK of Cagliari. He just isn't good enough.

Well yeah the club made the right call on him. I just didn't like the derision from the fans. He didn't deserve that, no matter how bad he was. And this is an unpopular opinion in Roma circles, but I truly don't think he was as bad as he was made out to be. He has always been a bang average keeper expected to be a world class keeper like his predecessor. The expectations outweighed the reality. It's a common problem for Romanisti.

It is a De Laurentis' fault now ?

Napoli players have deserted a  withdrawal. An  extremely gesture. These fines are logic in a normal club

Yes for me. The fines are not the problem, those are the normal consequence of the players actions. The problem was the mismanagement that led to that.

De Laurentiis' problem should have been with Ancelotti. Carlo was not pro-ritiro, he is the coach, it's his responsibility to manage the team. Then ADL believed he knew better than Carlo and forced the ritiro on him. Then the players rebelled.

There is a problem of authority, ADL and Carlo have to act together for the team to function. If not, then the players know that they don't go against their coach by not listen to president.

Carlo shouldn't have gone public (and private) against the ritiro. It means that he is against ADL managing his players.

I'm pro-coach. Let the coach work. If the coach is not what the president wants, then change it, but this mess of management styles just undermines authority.

Can gets a rare start


Juventus (4-3-1-2): Buffon; Cuadrado, Bonucci, De Ligt, Alex Sandro; Emre Can, Pjanic, Bentancur; Bernardeschi; Higuain, Ronaldo.

Sassuolo (4-2-3-1) Turati; Toljan, Marlon, Romagna, Kyriakopoulos; Magnanelli, Locatelli; Djuricic, Traorè, Boga; Caputo.

Minute 6, Can misses an actual tap in 2 meters from the goal

Higuain is on fire

This dominant we should be winning. We'd surely be up if Dybala was there instead of Ronaldo, he is out of form. Can please gtfo, a player that understands this type of football so little that he just gets in the way.

Sub in Ramsey for Can and Dybala for Ronaldo

A very uncharacteristic De Ligt-Buffon mistake to send us behind and now Ronaldo woke up. A great freekick and a bycicle kick within few minutes, Higuain should have scored from another action right after, intense match now.

TURATI honours his amazing surname

After 2.5 seasons, it's time we establish that Bernardeschi is another one of those failed mediocre Italian players. He's not Juventus material and hopefully Ramsey gets his fitness back so we could rarely ever see Bernardeschi starting again.

Can needs to go back to Germany or Man United. He's not Juventus material either.

And Buffon really shouldn't be starting games like these. Bad decision to bring him back and ideally shouldn't be starting any game other than Coppa Italia games.

Good showing from Bentancur once again. He, Dybala and Higuain were the only highlights of this game. A match we deserved to lose honestly.

Warrior wrote:Allan gets a 200 000€ fine
-25% of monthly salary for everyone else
Koulibaly put on transfer market

ADL is a wannabe dictator that nobody truly respects, he's a mad man and this will destroy everything he built these last 5 years. I certainly won't complain... would swap Rabiot for Allan

I haven't been paying attention to Serie A since the start of the season? what happened to cause this?

Cant say we deserve to lose a match where they created almost nothing and their GK was motm

Robespierre wrote:TURATI honours his amazing surname

Unreal how was that the performance of a primavera kid. We would have won with Consigli

Cant believe we had the best start of a season almost ever and Inter is going to win this league. Conte is incredible.

Someone sign Lautaro in January please.