Dusan Vlahovic attempted to wriggle free of Bologna defender Jhon Lucumi on the right-hand side of the Rossoblu penalty area.
The Serb shifted his feet one way then the other, but as Lucumi still stood in front of him, he had no option but to pass the ball centrally to his onrushing Juventus teammate Samuel Mbangula on the edge of the area.
The Belgian took one touch to steady himself then bent a beautiful curling shot into the top corner of Łukasz Skorupski’s goal, bringing the home crowd to their feet.
Mbangula had rescued an unlikely point for the Bianconeri, a game in which they were two goals down and seemingly on their way to a first league defeat of the season.
Amid a spate of draws, it was easy to forget that Juve haven’t lost in the league this season. Yet by the same token they aren’t winning many matches.
Juve have drawn nine matches from 15 in Serie A and — more importantly — are nine points worse off than they were at the same stage last season under Max Allegri.
Despite Motta being handed €200m’s worth of players last summer after Cristiano Giuntoli spent more money than any Juve sporting director since the utterly wasteful Fabio Paratici era, the club are lagging in almost every metric.
Goals scored and goals against are, coincidentally, nearly identical compared to this time a year ago: 23 scored and nine conceded in Allegri’s final season to 24 and 10 with Motta this season.
For everything else, the Tuscan’s stats look better. Juve had less possession (45% to 60%) and less precise passes per 90 under Allegri (347 to 506), but his Juve took more shots on target (13.9 to 12.7) and recovered the ball more per-game (52 to 43) than under Motta.
Moreover, there is the feeling among fans that Motta’s football isn’t that much more entertaining than Allegri’s non-football variant, which was one of the primary reasons the former Azzurri midfielder was hired.
There’s also the argument that Motta’s Juventus are futile, keeping possession for possession’s sake and lacking the killer touch that’s a hallmark of all great Bianconeri sides.
The critics are starting to sharpen their knives.
“It was said that Allegri was defensive, but Motta seems even more defensive than Max, with fewer points,” said former midfielder Marco Tardelli. “He was signed for his style of play, but we haven’t seen much of it.”
More criticism arrived from Juventus royalty, as Alessandro Del Piero questioned what modern Juve are. “They are in trouble, because teams are feeling comfortable playing against them, and they believe they can win,” he said to CBS Sports.
“The other teams are not afraid and Thiago Motta must work on this.”
On the one hand, Motta has to be given the benefit of the doubt, insofar as it’s his first season in Turin and every manager needs time to instil their beliefs. Yet on the other hand, Allegri’s second stint at the club saw Juve tighten the purse strings to levels not seen since the pre-Antonio Conte days, and Allegri was never the beneficiary of a €200m spending spree.
When that much money is spent, pressure comes straight away.
Motta hasn’t been helped by a major injury crisis. Nico Gonzalez, signed from Fiorentina for close to €40m, has hardly kicked a ball since arriving, the same applies to Douglas Luiz, who’s been out of action since mid-October.
Bremer and Juan Cabal are out for the season with ACL injuries; Teun Koopmeiners was out for a period of time, while Vlahovic just returned after a two-week lay-off that forced the manager to use Timothy Weah as a false nine.
The injuries have clearly played a part in Juve’s drop off in form — Bremer’s especially — yet Motta has been questioned on player selection. Koopmeiners excelled for Atalanta last season playing in a two-man midfield alongside Ederson. In Gian Piero Gasperini’s 4-2-3-1 system, Koopmeiners was allowed to break from deep, but Motta has positioned him as an attacking midfielder, playing higher up the pitch and often with his back to goal.
This clearly doesn’t work to his strengths, and it’s no surprise we haven’t seen the Koopmeiners of last season, who rattled in 15 goals in all competitions for La Dea. The hope is his goal against Bologna could ease the pressure on Juve’s biggest summer signing.
Vlahovic is another struggling under Motta. The striker’s time in Turin has been marred by inconsistency, which has only been exacerbated this season. Vlahovic’s minimalist approach to the game worked well with Allegri’s, the Serb has little interest in build-up play and merely wants to score goals.
Under Allegri this suited Vlahovic down to the ground, but Motta demands more from his strikers, and Vlahovic’s lack of technique, who often comes across as clumsy, simply doesn’t mesh well with the Italian-Brazilian’s vision of football.
Vlahovic works better for Serbia because he has another striker alongside him, usually Aleksandar Mitrovic, whom he can play off. At Juve, the likes of Koopmeiners, Francisco Conceicao and Kenan Yildiz are never close enough to Vlahovic to bring out the best in him, leaving him isolated in attack.
Furthermore, Vlahovic lacks the skill to dribble past defenders who sit deep and close off space, meaning he’s easily nullified.
The former Fiorentina man is Juventus’s highest earner on a reported €12m per-season, which is set to rise again should he stay next season. Juve, attempting to lower their overall debt, simply cannot afford to keep Vlahovic on those wages, and reportedly want him to sign a new deal with a lower wage. By all accounts Vlahovic has refused this idea, meaning a sale is very possible next summer.
Nearly three years on from signing, perhaps the time is right to move Vlahovic on, for you get the feeling that for as long as Motta is coach, Vlahovic isn’t his ideal striker. It’s been no surprise to see Juve linked with Joshua Zirkzee, a player who couldn’t be in more stark contrast to Vlahovic, as a possible January signing.
As the halfway point of the season looms, Juve find themselves four points away from the Champions League places, with fourth-placed Fiorentina having a game in hand over the Bianconeri.
There is full faith in the former Bologna coach, but there’s also a recognition that a top-four spot won’t be achieved by drawing games. Juventus have won just once from the last six games in all competitions and the last win in the league was over a month ago.
With the major level of investment made in the summer, qualifying for the Champions League next season is imperative. With so many injuries, adjusting his system may be the best course of action. Playing Yildiz closer to Vlahovic could also get the best out of the Serb.
Motta has many things to weigh up, but as Del Piero alluded to, teams don’t fear this iteration of The Old Lady. They’re fragile and appear there for the taking, something that’s never been said about any great Juventus side down the years.
They aren’t losing games, but neither are they winning, and Motta now has to figure out a way to turn one point into three, and fast.
