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Extended Clip - Who Is Andrea Cambiaso? Juventus’ New Total Footballer (Ep. 352)
1.6k Plays2 years ago
After a very impressive competitive debut for Juventus in the 2023/2024 Serie A opening win over Udinese, Nima Tavallaey and Carlo Garganese do a profile deep dive on Andrea Cambiaso.
This is an extended clip from this weeks free Monday episode of The Italian Football Podcast which is available on Spotify, Apple Podcasts and Google podcasts.
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Transcript
Andrea Cambiasso's Performance and Versatility
00:00:02
Speaker
Welcome to the Italian football podcast. Let's talk about Andrea Cambiasso, though. He was, as I said, man of the match in this 3-0 win against Udenez. And he was he was absolutely brilliant. He was brilliant. People that listened to the show for a while know that I've been a big fan of him for a long time, for over a year. I've lived for like a long time since we saw him in Genoa pretty much. I mean,
00:00:28
Speaker
Yeah, and for the Italy under 21s when he was playing on the right, I love how unorthodox this player is. He's such a modern guy, isn't he? Like, he's such a modern type of player in how he, like, the role he occupies. He's not a traditional wingback or anything like that. He's just
00:00:46
Speaker
I just think he's so modern in how he's got such a high footballing IQ as well.
Cambiasso's Football IQ and Role Models
00:00:52
Speaker
He knows how to interpret many different roles, the fact that he can play inverted as well. I really, really rate him.
00:00:59
Speaker
Absolutely. For me, he's one of the most unorthodox footballers I've seen in the world. We're not talking about ability here. He's such a unique player. I remember watching him play and write that for the other 21s.
00:01:18
Speaker
The way that he was cutting inside across the pitch, he was picking up the ball at right back and he was running diagonally with the ball into the center of midfield with it. And then it was so unrefreshing and unlike anything you've seen. And the opposition were like, you know, they didn't know what to do. The plays didn't know where to move. It was just it was it was amazing. And obviously he's playing on the left for Juventus. He's playing as a left wing back, depending on the three, five, two rather than a four man defense.
00:01:43
Speaker
But he is you know he says himself gel concealer is the player that he models his game on he was his idol he studies concealer he actually shows says he said yeah he actually said this talks about his intelligence says that he has virtually photographic memory.
00:02:00
Speaker
So he memorizes the movements of Cancello and then copies them. And actually Cancello sent him a Manchester City shirt and recently signed to him as a present. And you should have seen that they did a video you've entered that they put out on social media showing his reaction. And he was made up by it. I mean, he really does love the players. I mean, if he's even half the player that Cancello was, I mean, that would be fantastic.
Comparisons to Football Legends
00:02:26
Speaker
But
00:02:26
Speaker
But, you know, this game he was, I don't, you know, I mean, I don't like to draw comparisons to or, you know, to players in the past or present. But this, there's something about he's got characteristics, this unorthodox characteristics, this, this everything that you're describing, this ability that the fact that he's such an intelligent football player in terms of the photographic memory and all of that, but he can read situations, he can read
00:02:54
Speaker
He can read games and he knows he can read when to do what and how and what. To me, more than Canselo, he reminds me of Zambrotta. That aspect of his game reminds me of Zambrotta.
00:03:07
Speaker
Yeah. Yeah, no, I agree. I don't see Cancello in him that much. I mean, Cancello, I think, is a much better, you know, close ball dribbler. Like, Cancello is fantastic at dribbling past players in tight spaces. And, and Cambiaso, you know, we'll see. Let's see. But, I mean, Cambiaso is tactically a fascinating player. I mean, he plays as a left wing back. We're taking him from Juventus. He's a left wing back.
00:03:33
Speaker
but he comes in field. He's been playing and this is something that Mannionelli has been working on. This is clearly the print of Mannionelli.
Modern Football Tactics and Cambiasso's Role
00:03:42
Speaker
So he starts off as a left wing back, but then comes into the center of midfield. So he plays as an inverted left wing back. That then vacates the space on the left wing for Federico Chiesa to move into. We saw that in preseason. We also saw it during this
00:03:56
Speaker
during this game against Udenezer as well, which is really, really good. I mean, this is modern football. This is how modern football works. You couldn't do that with someone like Philip Kostich, for example, because he's a total one-dimensional linear player that just goes straight up and down the line. Now, this poses problems and it causes problems for opposition teams because it pulls
00:04:19
Speaker
defenders and players out of position and it opens up spaces and it creates overloads and you know so that's number one um but he also you know he's shown that he's very very flexible he played when he was pushing up really high as i said earlier as a left winger um pressing up high but he's also very comfortable playing in a back four you know he can play in a back four he played in a back four for last season for bologna
Cambiasso's Positional Flexibility
00:04:45
Speaker
he can play on the left he can play on the right he he can play in the midfield he start his career as a as a central trequartista so he's you know virtually attacking midfielder so he's an attacking player the attacking actually comes more more easier to him than than the defending
00:05:00
Speaker
Um, but you know, so he's, he's, yeah, he's a very, very interesting player, uh, very modern player. And I think he's the kind of player that, you know, we talk about it a lot about how Pep Guardiola, Arteta, Deserbe, Klopp, they love these kind of inverted players. Like to give you examples, you know, Klopp playing, uh, Trent, Alexander-Arnold was a right back. And then when Liverpool were in position,
00:05:24
Speaker
Alexander Arnold then moves into a central midfield role and goes from basically, it goes into a three man defence, it goes into basically a three, two, four, one or three, two, two, three kind of, you know, and, and, you know, Sinchenko, Arsenal playing as a left back, he moves into centre midfield and Arsenal have the ball. Pep doing the same with John Stones going from a centre back into a centre. You know, this is modern football players that
00:05:52
Speaker
that can morph from one role into another. It's huge. It's absolutely huge. And that they can do it throughout in one game. They can manage to do several roles in one game and it makes more fluid because teams are so well prepared defensively nowadays that you need to have that kind of fluidity about your game. And also the players have to be able to execute those tactics.
00:06:16
Speaker
Absolutely, and Cambiaso seems to be, you know, he's good on both sides. He can go right, he can go left. I mean, you know, look at the game against Udinese. The assist for Rabio's goal, beautiful, curled shot. I mean, he created two other chances in the game. He had two shots in the first half.
00:06:34
Speaker
and nearly scored 97% pass success rate, 100% cross success rate. I mean, he was, it was the ideal debut for, I mean, he's been at Juventus for a year, but this was his actual debut for Juventus.
Cambiasso's Career Journey and Impact
00:06:49
Speaker
And he's had a quite an interest in move up the pyramid because, you know, he came four years ago, he was playing Celia D.
00:06:56
Speaker
I think it was Alessandria he played for and then he moved up. Yeah, we'd said he achieved with Alessandria, but he was actually in Serie D with Savona. Yeah, sorry, you're right. And then he went to Empoli and Dionisi was there. Yeah, he's played in the space of three years. Yeah, in the space of three years, he played in all of the top four divisions.
00:07:17
Speaker
And Yomisi was there. I think he only made like eight, seven, eight matches played for them seven, eight times for Empoli when they were promoted to Serie A. So yeah, interesting play. It's a very interesting play to watch. Modern plan. I just have to say one other thing. Again, just shows that the left backs that Italy have coming through, something that
00:07:38
Speaker
is great. It's great to see. We have such a depth that left that. But luckily with Cambiaso, he can also play on the right. And that brings me to the Zamzambrotta thing. Do you know what I mean? Because given that Italy have Di Marco, Parisi or Doji, well Cambiaso can just slide into the right.
00:07:58
Speaker
Hopefully, hopefully, yeah, hopefully that will happen. And yeah, and Zambrata is a great chef, because Zambrata also started as a forward when he was young. He was a forward, then he moved into a wide midfielder. When he joined Juventus, he was a wide midfielder. And then it was Lippi that had the idea to bring him back as a wingback, as a full back. Yeah. And then he played as a wingback, full back, right, left, everywhere. Yeah, yeah, absolutely.