AS Roma – Juventus: Spoils Shared, Appreciated By None (1-1)

Daniele De Rossi tweaked his usual midfield arrangement, to gain the early advantage over Juventus. But similar problems off the ball enabled the visitors to swing the momentum of the game throughout.

Tactical analysis and match report by Joel Parker.

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To strengthen their place in a Champions League spot, Captain Future had to devise a plan to manoeuvre past the Old Lady. 

Perhaps a recognisable Jewel will grab her attention; Paulo Dybala has been flourishing under Daniele De Rossi, his best goal contribution tally since he was playing in black and white under Massimiliano Allegri. Despite Roma’s respark, they appear to be a team beginning to tire. After finishing off the final twenty minutes against Udinese, Roma conceded twenty-seven shots at Napoli. They started positively against the immortal Bayer Leverkusen, before Xabi Alonso’s men flexed their muscles in the eternal city. 

Despite being above them in the standings, Juve went into this game grumpy and dissatisfied. Change is inevitable in the summer and since Juve was defeated in a title six-pointer away at Internazionale, they have struggled to get back into any groove; just two Serie A wins in eleven games – although a Coppa Italia final is on the horizon. 

Five changes were made to the Roma team that lost 2-0 at home to Leverkusen in the Europa League. Most of these were in the defense, as Rick Karsdorp, Gianluca Mancini, Chris Smalling and Leonardo Spinazzola were replaced by Rasmus Kristensen, Diego Llorente, Evan Ndicka and Angeliño. The only other change was in the attack, as Stephan El Shaarawy was replaced by Tommaso Baldanzi.

Allegri made two changes, from the 0-0 draw at home to AC Milan. Weston McKennie came in for Filip Kostić, which saw Andrea Cambiaso move back into a wing-back position. In the attack, Kenan Yıldız was replaced by Federico Chiesa.

Paredes the pillar

De Rossi made a major change to the way Roma built from the back. Usually, they would require Leandro Paredes roaming as the single pivot, and although he continued to roam, Roma where more situated with two center-midfielders (the other being Bryan Cristante) in the deep build. On the left, Lorenzo Pellegrini bounced between holding width and moving inside, whilst Dybala and Baldanzi were positioned more on the right side.

The positions in the build were very adjustable, as has been the way under De Rossi, but to move through into the Juve half, Roma would require more movement from Paredes. This was because Juve pressed in a very cautious and narrow manner. In the 5-3-2 formation, both Federico Chiesa and Dušan Vlahović covered the center-backs, whilst the three midfielders stepped onto the two Roma midfielders. The Juve wing-back would move to the Roma fullback and Juve could congest the center of the field quite easily. This nearly bared fruit when Dybala received a pass from Kristensen, before Bremer and Andrea Cambiaso hassled the Argentine off the ball. Chiesa dribbled inside and Vlahović shaved the post with his shot.

5^th minute: Buildup to Vlahović chance. Kristensen passed the ball inside to Dybala, who had dropped to aid the buildup. With the two forward options man-marked, Bremer stepped out and Cambiaso turned to press Dybala. Bremer turned the ball over with Chiesa in a perfect position to take the ball into the box. With Paredes and Cristante strictly staying in the center, Juve’s flat midfield could easily overload on the double pivot and encourage Roma to pass into traps like this one.

Roma soon found a way to harness control and it would require Paredes to move out into the left-back zone or between the two center-backs. This is where the numerical advantage would change, as it would require one of the strikers to cover Cristante, whilst Roma disrupted the Juve midfielders as Weston Mckennie started to follow Angeliño/Pellegrini further down the field.

6^th minute: How Roma gained control into the middle third. With Paredes filtering into the left-back space, Cristante became the single pivot and Chiesa occupied him as the ball went from Svilar to Kristensen. The right-back passed to Llorente, which delayed Chiesa’s time to press him and Llorente carried the ball around the Italian. Now the Juve midfield is more disrupted with Rabiot having to step out on Cristante, Locatelli occupying Pellegrini and McKennie covering the zonal spot as Angeliño has moved ahead of the ball.

Once the ball was in the middle third, Paredes would move into the center of the pitch, between the two center-backs. Cristante remained vertical to Paredes and Roma heavily overloaded the right side of the pitch, Pellegrini came towards the ball side and Baldanzi held the width, which ultimately led to bounce passes back to Dybala, who moved into the pockets of space created around Juve’s midfield.

As Paredes dictated in the center, it enabled Ndicka and Llorente to step out ahead of the ball, which kept Juve’s midfield from directly responding towards the ball. This movement was more prominent with Ndicka, and Angeliño produced some decent crosses from deep-left positions – Kristensen hit the crossbar from one of them – but all the Roma progression came through the right side of the field: and it’s from that spot where Roma punctured through.

After Roma reset in possession, Paredes was now on the right of Llorente and as Dybala moved towards the ball, Kristensen was left free holding the width, as he received, Cambiaso stepped up and Baldanzi made his run through. Now Dybala was ahead of the midfielders and arrived in the box to support, he moved the ball back to Cristante whose shot from close range was blocked, but Romelu Lukaku was in a position for the rebound.

Big holes for Juve to run through

Roma lost momentum after the goal, as their deep build changed their axis. Now they were trying to move the ball more quickly, with more direct passes coming out from the defenders and fullbacks as they moved into deep-wide positions. Lukaku was not always in the position to compete or hold the ball up, and Juve was handed plenty of opportunities to reset and start attacks of their own.

They took up on that offer, and Roma supported them further with an off-ball approach that left a lot of space behind the first line of pressure. Down the right side, this meant that Federico Gatti could move ahead of the space to drag Pellegrini with him and Timothy Weah could take the ball inside to encourage Dybala to approach him and leave Manuel Locatelli free. Gatti and Weah piled more pressure down that side further up the field as McKennie held the width.

15^th minute: Juve easily manipulated Roma off the ball. Gatti passed to Weah and his run ahead of the ball dragged Pellegrini with him. Dybala stops covering Locatelli to encounter Weah, but Weah passes through to Locatelli and the Italian can switch to Chiesa on the opposite flank.

When resetting off the ball, De Rossi’s team was not always set in a compact formation. Cristante followed Adrien Rabiot out towards the flank, even with Baldanzi in a position where he could block off that pass. This dynamic allowed Rabiot to easily move inside or make runs in the halfspace that disrupted Roma further; something that Weah was also able to accomplish as, situationally, Rabiot moved onto the same side to keep Paredes deep.

Roma were guilty of partnering two-on-one against the Juve players, without the compact coverage behind them and Allegri’s team found it easy to increase the pressure through runs from deep positions. At the half-hour mark, Juve was able to circulate in the second phase of a corner and the ball was switched back to Chiesa on the right side. He dummied Pellegrini to move the ball back onto his left foot and Bremer rose highest to head the ball in.

Chiesa cutting through

The first half concluded with both teams producing the same dynamics, but more transition-like moves came creeping through. Roma’s effectiveness on the ball would be hindered as Dybala was taken off, and replaced by Nicola Zalewski. At the beginning of the second period, Angeliño’s inside pass was intercepted and Gatti fired the ball through to Chiesa against a very disjointed Roma defensive line. After cutting past Kristensen, Chiesa pinged a shot towards the far post, smacking the inside of it and bouncing out the opposite direction.

Chiesa cutting inside on his right foot was a thorn in Roma’s side. The winger held the width on the left, with the direct-running Rabiot driving Cristante away and Cambiaso working inside of Chiesa to stop Kristensen from directly approaching the winger.

48^th minute: Rabiot carried the ball from the middle third towards the corner of the box. With Cristante dragged and Cambiaso pushing inside to keep the fullback away from the channel, Chiesa was given free rein to rotate back inside with the ball. His cross amounted to nothing, but his access back inside from the wide channel was available.

Juve had the wide trio to disrupt Roma, but not the forms of chance creation to properly exploit it. Chiesa forced a good save from Mile Svilar at his front post, after cutting inside after a switch to his channel. During this period, Roma was still able to cleanly break through Juve’s high block, but when they where able to pin Cristante and Ndicka in wide positions and intercept their passes, Juve still struggled to produce from those moments past the hour mark.

Unable to create a winner

Off came Lukaku and Baldanzi, on came Tammy Abraham and Sardar Azmoun. The addition of two strikers sustained some momentum that Roma had built. With Zalewski and Angeliño positioned down one flank, Pellegrini had less obligation to support the attack down the left channel so he started to appear on the right more frequently, with Cristante crashing the box as another aerial threat.

Despite progressing from one end to the other in quick fashion, Roma missed a winger that could drive at the defense as well as decent box delivery for the tall players in the box. Roma was more fluid on the ball, but Juve carried more potency, which made Allegri’s substitutions a bit bizarre when he took both Chiesa and Vlahović off with fifteen minutes still to play.

The best chance towards the end fell to Juventus. Filip Kostić, who replaced Weah earlier in the game, crossed into the penalty area and was nodded away from the Roma defense, but the ball fell to Locatelli. His sliding shot, which bounced into the ground, created a peculiar attempt, one that saw the ball dropping towards the top corner until Svilar pushed the ball away. Both attacks had fizzled out by this point, despite both teams having various spells of momentum, that should have seen better attempts at goal.

Takeaways

Roma under De Rossi is off to a curious start. The results have been solid, although the Champions League position is under threat with Atalanta three points behind (two games in hand at the time of writing and with Atalanta vs Roma still on the calendar.) Roma’s buildup is fluid, ambitious and exciting, but their off-ball approach is a complete mess, one that has seen plenty of shots being conceded. De Rossi has a big task in finding a balance that gets the best of both worlds.

The result is more favorable for Juventus, a spot in next year’s prestigious European competition is all but confirmed. Allegri will not be there, but Juve’s attempts at playing more “attractive” football, did not fully form the last time they attempted such a transition.