The Bianconeri coach pulled a tactical coup in Germany, booking Juve’s spot for the quarter-finals in emphatic fashion, 3–0 on the night and 5–1 on aggregate.
Ahead of his Champions League quarter-final against Borussia Dortmund, all the talk was on whether Massimiliano Allegri would opt for the 3-5-2 or stick with his 4-3-1-2.
In the end Allegri chose the 4-3-1-2, but in fact used both, switching his formation after Paul Pogba was taken off due to injury. With Dortmund barely challenging Juventus throughout the game, they never stood a chance against two of them.
Since Allegri’s arrival, the question had always been about whether he would stick with former coach Antonio Conte’s formation (the 3-5-2) or scrap it for one of his own.
Progress for a team can be a difficult thing to gauge, and especially in the case of Juventus who are on their way towards a fourth successive Scudetto. Therefore, Champions League progression was always going to stand as an important barometer.
As far as that barometer goes, Conte’s 3-5-2 had always been faulted as unadapted to European jousts. On Thursday, Juventus scored one goal under Allegri’s 4-3-1-2 and then two more — in the second half — when playing in Conte’s 3-5-2.
More so than just the goals, Juventus controlled the game from the time Pogba left the pitch and Allegri changed the formation to the final whistle.
In effect, Gianluigi Buffon only made his first save of the game on 62 minutes, comfortably smothering Kevin Kampl’s tame effort. Indeed if Jurgen Kohler, former Dortmund defender and 1997 Champions League winner, had fingered Buffon as Juventus’ weak link, then Allegri came with the perfect strategy to protect him.
Moreover Allegri won using the 3-5-2 without Pogba, without Andrea Pirlo, and with an Andrea Barzagli who was returning from a long-term injury that had him sidelined for months.
The veritable progress of this Juventus side is not simply in making the 3-5-2 viable in Europe however. The progress of this Juventus team exists in the synthesis Allegri was capable of engineering.
Allegri has seamlessly moved from the 4-3-1-2 to the 3-5-2 and back depending on the scenario. The rotation of the players and versatile roles he has given his midfielders have also been worthy of praise.
Thursday night was the perfect away performance. Juventus frustrated Dortmund, ground their midfield to dust, stifled their attack and blitzed their defence.
It was the perfect synthesis of collective effort defensively and genius individualism offensively; best illustrated by Carlos Tevez’s brilliant performance (two goals and one assist) and his thunderous opening strike.
[dailymotion]http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x2jwf4f_goal-carlos-tevez-dortmund-0-1-juventus-18-03-2015_sport[/dailymotion]
Juventus have now sealed their quarter-final berth, for the second time since the 2012-13 Champions League season when Bayern Munich knocked them out.
So in terms of absolute value, Juventus’ qualification against Dortmund would not — on paper at least — serve as proof of progression.
The proof is neither in the validation of the 3-5-2 nor is it in having helped Tevez score in three of this last four Champions League games (as many times as in his previous 28); but it exists in the flexible nature and intelligent approach of their new coach, who looks to have finally gotten Juventus over their Champions League yips.
Great article, I totally agree, tactically I’m sorry to say but to me allegri destroys conte.He switches formation mid game seamlessly he uses 3 different formations instead of one no matter the occasion, he rotates the squad wayyy more, he even took conte’s beloved 3-5-2 that was utterly disgusting in UCL and made it great by making a predominantly defensive formation a counter attacking one.
I honestly can’t see any flaws to him right now and I can really see us winning a 5th scudetto next year. I was obviously happy with conte but i always saw these tactical flaws in him, and was one of the only juventini to be happy to see allegri replace him.