Transcript
Speaker: Welcome to the Italian football podcast. Angel Di Maria, red carded in this game in the first half, elbow to the stomach of Armando Iso, he made the most of it, to be fair, but you can't do that. You swing your elbow, even if you make the lightest of touches, you're going to get red carded. Yeah, it's part of the rules of the game.
Speaker: It was just a moment of stupidity. As I said before, I think it reflected the nervousness in the Juventus camp at the moment, but it also reflected how Di Maria is feeding right now. The people I've spoken to, he's not happy with Allegri. It's been well reported that he's
Speaker: He's had a falling out with Allegri. From Allegri's side, he's not happy with De Maria. He thought he would be someone that could come in and make the difference, give them the leap of quality. And he hasn't done that. And from De Maria's side, he's unhappy with, one, how his injury was managed. And I think he's absolutely right about that. He's been rushed back twice and got injured twice.
Speaker: And two, he's obviously looking at Allegri and he's just thinking, what the hell have I come into here? I mean, who is this manager? What the hell is he doing? You know, what kind of football is he playing? You know, he's come from a team of superstars and he's suddenly playing with, you know, Weston McKinney and Desilio when he looks to pass to his right, he sees those two.
Speaker: And when he looks to pass to his left, he's got Alexandre. Alexander is not a bad player compared to the gems, the creme de la cremes that you mentioned there before. Did you see, by the way, this is a separate one, did you see that there was a moment in the first half where Mckenny did a five -yard sideways pass to Tashido, the simplest pass you'll ever get? I mean, the kind of pass that
Speaker: five -year -old school kids would do, no problem. And he passed it straight out of play. And that just summed up basically where Juventus were at. But I mean, with Di Maria, I guess there's two sides to this, but is this another transfer mistake from Juventus?
Speaker: I'm not sure I'm not sure I'm not ready to say that because I don't think I could be Maria is the player he was. And he's one of my favorite players of the last decade. I loved him around Madrid. I think he was a gorgeous little player at PSG. Just so intelligent. I would have loved to have him at Inter. Fortunately, I never materialized.
Speaker: But no, I think it's too soon. I think the problem is that if you're going to bring in experienced players like that, then you have to be careful on how you play them, how you coach them, how you train them. And Allegri is using archaic
Speaker: preparation techniques and Jay Jay Medical seem completely clueless as to what they're actually doing and and what you know what they're they seem completely they have no idea what they're doing and they're making injuries worse as we saw and then I like these comments confirmed in me.
Speaker: About we admitted it. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, it's that that's the level of that to me that's unprofessionalism in today's game. And that's why that's why he's pissed the Maria. One of the reasons he's pissed and he's got every right to be. I mean, that I've never heard a coach in the last 10 years say say something at this level at one of the top clubs admit to playing an injured player and then he he worsens his injury and then just acts like it's raining. Genuinely astonishing.
Speaker: But, but I think it's too soon. I think it's too soon to say that. But I do understand why you'd think that. Well, I don't think that, to be honest, I don't think I'm not necessarily things to transfer mistake. But I think you know that when you've been assigned him, I questioned it. I everybody was getting really excited about it. And just like they were with Pogba. And I was just like, Hang on a minute. Let's just look at the bigger picture here. From a Juventus transfer policy point of view, this just smacks
Speaker: of short -termism, again, which has been my whole criticism of the events. My whole criticism of the events as transit policy, well, let's just take the last year or so, has been twofold.
Speaker: is that they're not buying players to fit a certain formation or style of play. When you start off at the beginning of a summer market, you should sit down. They should all sit down. Allegri was part of the decision making this summer. It should be Allegri, Arriva Benet, Terribini, whoever else, so sit down and say, right.
Speaker: What formation are we playing next season? What style of play are we playing? And once you've decided that, you say, right, based on that, we need to buy a striker. We need to buy a central midfielder. We need to buy a left winger to play left in our 4 -3 -3. They need to have these attributes.
Speaker: That's what you, that's what you sit down and decide. Now with Juventus, they don't know what their formation is, because Allegri's changing it every single week, still doesn't know what it is. They don't have a style or identity at all. So basically what they've done is they've just ended up, and this has happened for a few years in a row actually, it even happened with Sadie when he didn't get the players that he needed for his type of football.
Speaker: is you get a mishmash of players, some players that can play in one formation, some players that can play in another formation, some players that can't play with one another, not enough depth for one formation, not enough depth for another formation. To give you the best example, the 3 -5 -2 formation, which you say is the best formation to use, and I'd probably agree with you, but only when everyone's available. And you go with the 3 -5 -2 formation, you've got Milik and Vlovich,
Speaker: and then you don't have a backup forward. You've got one, you've got Keene, you're basically playing with 10 men when you have him. So you can't go into a season trying to play 3 -5 -2 formation when the only backup forward you've got is Moissa Keene.
Speaker: even if he was good, you need more depth than that. So, you know, this is the problem with the transport. So, De Maria, the way that he fitted into that was, well, what formation you play with him? And number two, look at his age. You know, he's 34, he's going to be 35 midway through this season.
Speaker: you know, he's getting on. And if you get on, you're going to get injuries. We've seen that already. I also had question marks over his motivation. And that's also been leaking out that there's fears allegory and some fears within the club that his mind is on the World Cup, you know, he wanted to join a club just so that he could get himself ready for November.
Speaker: Well, well, basically, by the time he comes back from from suspension, he's already missed seven games now. And he's going to miss another three. That's ten games missed before he comes back. By the time he comes back, the World Cup is basically here. So he's basically not contributed anything up until up until the World Cup. So that's already half the season pretty much gone. So, yeah, he's definitely got a lot of repair work to do. It's not been confirmed that Di Maria has gotten three match ban, is it?
Speaker: No, but it's probably going to be two or three. It's violent conduct. I mean, the automatic is three games. I think it's three automatic. Yeah, but I don't think I think they appear. Yeah, I think they will appeal because I think three would be a little bit. Well, either way, nine, ten punch someone in the face. I mean, it's like, yes, it was an elbow. We know it's a straight, you know, whatever. But it's not. It's not. It wasn't it's violent conduct by the letter of the law, but it wasn't
Speaker: He's played 219 minutes of football so far, so I mean, it hasn't gone well. It wasn't Roy Keane on Alfigny Hoaland, it wasn't Eric Cantona, pick your favourite one. I mean, that's my point. And I think he'll get two matches. But no, I agree with you. And he'll miss quite a few games again.
Speaker: It's a concerning situation and also if this is his last chance to win something big and I don't with all due respect to Copa America, this is his last chance to win the World Cup and Messi's chance as well. It's the last chance of that generation and I think
Speaker: I have Argentina as my favorite to win the World Cup because I think they finally have a team that's balanced. And I think he's an integral part of that. And I think he's going to come to that World Cup prepared like no one else in order to win that World Cup. And then what happens after that? Does he give a crap about you a bit? Well, yeah, that's the question mark as well when he comes back as well. He's certainly going to be fresh going into the World Cup. Let's say that.
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