Inter Milan collapsed at the Olympic Stadium, while we had a painless draw between Jose Mourinho’s Roma and Max Allegri’s Juventus. Another Serie A weekend ended with several interesting matches to discuss. Let’s see what happened…
MATCH OF THE WEEK – Juventus vs Roma
The most important match of the weekend, for the seasonal goals of the two teams and for the two coaches involved, Massimiliano Allegri and José Mourinho. The two congratulated each other before and after the match, also because Saturday’s match was a trap.
The Bianconeri came from a bad draw against Sampdoria, Roma had won the previous two games but often suffered a defeat when they went to Turin. On Saturday afternoon the two teams played one half each. In the first half the Bianconeri immediately found the advantage with a masterpiece free-kick by Dusan Vlahovic, then they failed on several occasions to close the match.
After the break, Mourinho fielded the Giallorossi with the 4-2-3-1, occupying better spaces of the pitch and finding the equaliser thanks to Tammy Abraham. Lorenzo Pellegrini corner, Paulo Dybala’s overhead assist and a header from the English striker. The two teams went home with one point each, with the Special One’s team climbing to 7 points. At the end of the match the Portuguese coach said: “At the end of the first half I told my guys that I was ashamed to be their coach.” Then came the reaction of his team, which played much better. Few clear scoring opportunities, but a lot of intensity and rhythms of a proper big match, despite being only August.
INDIVIDUAL PERFORMANCE OF THE WEEK – Fabio Miretti (Juventus)
One of the best on the pitch, perhaps the best on the pitch for Juventus. Allegri trusted the young Italian midfielder, preferring him to Denis Zakaria and Weston McKennie, players with much more experience and in theory more ready for a big match like the one against Roma, but Miretti was truly surprising.
He took the space on the centre-left, taking advantage of the bad performance of Rick Karsdorp and the difficulties of the couple Nemanja Matic-Bryan Cristante in the midfield, perfectly managing every single ball played. Considering he is just a 2003, he really played an incredible game, which one might have expected from a 25-26 year old player, at least.
Allegri will hardly be able to do without him, if every time he takes the field he will do so with this reliability and this quality. A real reinforcement for the Juventus midfield, which at this start of the season had encountered some difficulties with Adrien Rabiot and Manuel Locatelli playing badly.
Surely Miretti is a player to follow for the future, but in the meantime Allegri trusts him, so much so that he played him from the first minute in a delicate match like the one against Roma. And this means a lot.
PLAYER OF THE WEEK – Charles De Ketelaere (AC Milan)
There was great anticipation for his arrival at Milan. The Rossoneri have been looking for him for several weeks, have waited for him for a long time and have spent millions on him. The Belgian with his new jersey immediately made the difference, showing his technical qualities.
Running, dribbling, technique, game vision and key passes: in his first game as a starter, against Bologna, he was immediately decisive, with a good assist for Rafael Leao, who scored the first goal of the game. De Ketelaere immediately earned the consideration of the champion and in his first match with the Rossoneri he proved right to those who in recent weeks had portrayed him as a pure talent.
The comparisons are obviously already many, some say he is similar to Kakà, but it is clearly early, because the Belgian attacking midfielder will have to confirm himself game after game, even when his opponents begin to know him better. The beginning of the adventure, however, is definitely encouraging. Stefano Pioli has two players able to unlock the games at any time, between him and Leao the quality in the Rossoneri attack is very high and the Rossoneri strikers will have the opportunity to score many goals.
Paolo Maldini and Ricky Massara, the Milan managers, have shown once again that they are truly far-sighted.
TEAM PERFORMANCE OF THE WEEK – Salernitana
Last weekend Sampdoria had stopped Allegri’s Juventus, even going close to victory, while in Sunday’s match they lost, even being overwhelmed by Nicola’s Salernitana.
The Granata showed that they had a lot of talent already in the first two games, even when they showed interesting things against Roma, but many strong and quality players arrived from the market and on Sunday we saw it. Nicola’s team beat Sampdoria 4-0, in a game that could have had an even greater result, scoring beautiful goals and leaving nothing at all on the pitch.
Federico Bonazzoli has now grown up and is one of the leaders of Salernitana, after having contributed to the confirmation in Serie A last year, but the new signings of Tonny Vilhena, Giulio Maggiore, Antonio Candreva and Boulaye Dia are showing the first results. This year a miracle may not be necessary for avoiding relegation to Serie B, Salernitana is already a team, there is already a group and you can see all this on the pitch.
