For the first time in two years, Massimiliano Allegri stopped tinkering. Since returning to Juventus in 2021, he had taken charge of 112 games and changed his starting XI in every single one. There was genuine shock in the press box at the Mapei Stadium on Saturday as journalists realised the team to face Sassuolo was the same one that beat Lazio 3-1 a week before.
Allegri has suggested previously that his team selections rely on intuition more than over-analysis, telling La Repubblica: “I can’t stay 24 hours searching for a solution, I have to wait for inspiration to arrive.” It is easy to understand why his gut might have told him to stick, not twist, on this occasion. Juventus were brilliant against Lazio: exerting control even without possession against last season’s runners-up.
For the first time in a long while, there was a buzz about his team. Juventus were not awful last season – without the points penalty imposed upon them for false accounting they would have finished joint-third – yet the style of football was bleak: a grim low block accompanied by a vague hope that one of the team’s well-paid forwards would eventually put the ball in the net.
Right from the opening weekend, this season felt different. Juventus beat Udinese 3-0 but more than that they played with pace and aggression, taking the lead in the second minute and then going for the jugular rather than sitting back.
Perhaps it was the departure of some of the squad’s oldest members – Ángel Di María, Leonardo Bonucci and Juan Cuadrado – the arrival of fresher faces such as Andrea Cambiaso and Timothy Weah, or the return of a fully fit Federico Chiesa, but there was an energy to Juventus’s play that had been lacking. Allegri’s choice to deploy the latter player up front with Dusan Vlahovic, instead of on the wing, was rewarded with devastating combinations between them.
Juventus drew their second game, at home to Bologna, but wins over Empoli and Lazio followed. Beating Sassuolo on Saturday would have put them top of the table for a night at least. A meaningless landmark after five games but nevertheless one to fuel fans’ belief that this could be their season to reclaim the Serie A title. Banned from European competition, Juventus should have fresher legs than their Scudetto rivals.
That, too, might have been a factor in Allegri’s decision to name an unchanged side. The same choices, however, did not lead to the same result. Juventus’s unbeaten start was curtailed with a brutal 4-2 defeat.
It was not the scoreline that burned so much as the path to get there. Sassuolo’s opening goal arrived from a blunder by Wojciech Szczesny, who misjudged a shot from Armand Laurienté and parried into his own net.
Juventus equalised through an own goal – though here it felt harsh to put too much blame on Matías Viña. Chiesa’s cross from the left would have been poked in by Weston McKennie at the back post if the defender had not got his toe in first.
Parity did not last long. Szczesny made a fine save from a Ruan Tressoldi header but could not keep out a bending shot from Domenico Berardi just before half-time. This goal was more painful for the knowledge he could have been playing on the opposite side.
It feels as though the Bianconeri have been trying to sign Berardi for almost his entire career. In his early 20s he rebuffed them, and other leading Serie A teams, because he preferred to stay at Sassuolo, the club whose academy he had graduated from and where he believed his development would be better served by starting regularly instead of sitting on someone else’s bench.
Now 29, Berardi says he has been open to a move for at least the last four years but none has materialised. He agreed personal terms with Juventus this summer but they were unable to make a deal with Sassuolo. Both the fee and the structure of the move were reported to be sticking points, with Juventus seeking to have an initial paid loan leading into a subsequent full purchase.
This was Berardi’s 300th game in Serie A, and his 116th goal – not bad for someone who lines up mostly on the wing. That such a player has only played four games in Uefa competitions, all in Sassuolo’s 2016-17 Europa League run, when he scored five times, feels insufficient. Certainly, it is easy to see why Juventus would want him. This was his fifth combined goal or assist against them in six meetings.
Berardi should have been sent off on Saturday, though, for a horrific studs-up challenge on Bremer early in the second half. The decision by referee Andrea Colombo only to award a yellow card was surprising but that of the VAR officials with access to replays not to intervene was mystifying.
Still, Juventus looked on course to claim at least a point when Chiesa fired in a deflected shot with 12 minutes to go. Instead, moments later, Sassuolo reclaimed the lead, Andrea Pinamonti heading home after Szczesny parried a rasping Laurienté effort out into the middle of the box.
Sassuolo kept pushing. Grégoire Defrel hit the bar in injury time before Juventus’s Federico Gatti finished the job for them: receiving the ball from Szczesny and panicking under pressure before playing a no-look pass into his own net.
It was a humiliating mistake from a player beginning his first full season as starter at centre-back. Gatti’s surname translates as “Cats” so, as more than one internet wag pointed out, at least this would not be the first time that Gatti videos topped the viral viewing charts.
Lecce 1-0 Genoa, Salernitana 1-1 Frosinone, Lazio 1-1 Monza, Sassuolo 4-2 Juventus, Milan 1-0 Verona, Torino 1-1 Roma, Udinese 0-2 Fiorentina, Atalanta 2-0 Cagliari, Empoli 0-1 Internazionale
Allegri struck the right note by playing down the incident. “Gatti has made mistakes before and he will make more in the future,” said the manager. “That’s part of a footballer’s career, and his own goal did not change the result.”
The greater questions facing Juventus are not about that mistake, nor Szczesny’s, but whether this team is really ready for the title push that some had imagined. Has Chiesa’s sparkling form simply been obscuring unresolved issues elsewhere in the team?
Vlahovic scored a pair of well-taken goals against Lazio, but he fluffed his lines when clean through in this game at 2-1 and still needs to prove that he can decide games with the consistency expected of a player who cost more than €70m.
Although Juventus’s attacking output has improved with Chiesa and Vlahovic together up front, the team still play with a relatively low block meaning that the Serbian often receives the ball with his back to goal – a context in which he rarely looks his most comfortable.
A loss to Sassuolo is hardly a cause for panic, but this was a reality check for Juventus after their fast start. On Tuesday they will seek to bounce back against a Lecce team who, unlike them, remain undefeated. It will be the first time ever that the two teams meet with the Salentini looking down on Juventus in the standings.
| Pos | Team | P | GD | Pts |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Inter Milan | 5 | 13 | 15 |
| 2 | AC Milan | 5 | 3 | 12 |
| 3 | Lecce | 5 | 4 | 11 |
| 4 | Juventus | 5 | 5 | 10 |
| 5 | Fiorentina | 5 | 2 | 10 |
| 6 | Atalanta | 5 | 5 | 9 |
| 7 | Napoli | 5 | 3 | 8 |
| 8 | Frosinone | 5 | 1 | 8 |
| 9 | Torino | 5 | 1 | 8 |
| 10 | Verona | 5 | -1 | 7 |
| 11 | Bologna | 5 | -1 | 6 |
| 12 | Sassuolo | 5 | -2 | 6 |
| 13 | Roma | 5 | 5 | 5 |
| 14 | Monza | 5 | -3 | 5 |
| 15 | Lazio | 5 | -3 | 4 |
| 16 | Genoa | 5 | -4 | 4 |
| 17 | Salernitana | 5 | -5 | 3 |
| 18 | Udinese | 5 | -5 | 3 |
| 19 | Cagliari | 5 | -5 | 2 |
| 20 | Empoli | 5 | -13 | 0 |
