Roma find themselves out of the Champions League spots and it is evident that the team have some flaws that not even an experienced coach like Jose Mourinho can fix at the moment.
The Giallorossi are sixth in the Serie A table with 19 points after 12 rounds and they surprisingly lost 3-2 to newly-promoted Venezia in the Sunday lunchtime game. Despite a change in formation, it was not enough to deliver a positive result for the Roman club.
Mourinho has great pedigree as a coach but this Roma side clearly do not compare to the teams he coached in the past.
ROMA DOMINANCE NOT ENOUGH TO OVERWHELM VENEZIA
Mourinho has often implemented the 4-2-3-1 throughout his career with the occasional formation change depending on the opponent or the players at his disposal. Against Venezia, he decided to use the 3-4-1-2 formation, which seemed to be beneficial for the Giallorossi offensively.
Roma dominated the possession 61 to 39 percent, led the shot count 27 to 13, and completed 473 successful passes compared to Venezia’s 305. Unfortunately for them, the Giallorossi lost the ball 142 times to 115, and most importantly, the Arancioneroverdi were better finishers.
There were some VAR decisions that also drew the ire of the Roman contingent.
They thought that they had a penalty soon after Venezia opened the scoring but a Roma player was adjudged to have been offside in the build-up. The Venetians earned a penalty in the second half and the Lupi claimed that a Venezia player committed a foul in the build-up but the decision was not reversed.
Despite the controversy about the refereeing decisions, Roma had their own issues.
Although the attacking triumvirate of Lorenzo Pellegrini, Eldor Shomurodov, and Tammy Abraham played well; Stephan El Shaarawy was wasteful with his shooting; Bryan Cristante and Jordan Veretout failed to provide adequate cover for the defenders; the back three struggled to contain Venezia’s attacks; and Rui Patricio’s saves were needed to prevent the score from looking more embarrassing.
Mourinho’s substitutions also made minimal effect. Carles Perez, Nicolo Zaniolo, Borja Mayoral, and Nicola Zalewski were brought on in the second half but they could not turn the result around for Roma. Three of the substitutions perhaps could have been made earlier but Perez came on after Mattia Aramu scored for Venezia and he struggled to make a positive impact.
The Arancioneroverdi should be given some credit for their performance too. They attacked in a fast and direct manner whilst the likes of Sergio Romero, Mattia Caldara, and the aforementioned Aramu had excellent games.
It would be too easy to say that Mourinho is past his best but he will probably continue to struggle to produce consistent results with this Roma squad.
