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A self-motivated Juve beat real.

A crap game vs. Torino was won; and we got away with a few errors which Torino could've easily scored

Frankly speaking, the Bologna game was won by Nedved's brilliance.

Now the Roma game admittedly was a little more convincing...not to sound mean, but Roma are quite poor so far.

Try Real Madrid - Juve: Real at home, who are on a decent form, champions league, aiming at nothing less than 3 points. If Juve can win or at least control the game to a certain extent and earn a draw...and I'll start giving the positives to Ranieri.

Because honestly, despite the injury crisis, it looked like Ranieri had no idea what he was doing vs. BATE, Palermo, Napoli.... it really looked like a manager who lost control of his team, which is why we (I) were complaining!

 

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Not topping Serie A/CL, after our transfer campaign I wasn't too optimistic...but neither did I expect them to be struggling at times.

IMO - on paper we're similar to the team of last season; therefore I expected Juve should've maintained last season's 4th-2nd place push.

Whom do I prefer? I'm still a believer in Deschamps as a manager, like a person who chooses players he wants for his team (like in the EPL where managers usually have influence over the transfer target, as opposed to the puppet we have). Of course Lippi was great...but he already experienced his second coming at Juve. Plus it's also due to the management. Imagine if Deschamps couldn't tolerate them, you think Lippi will?

 

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...and Juve veterans in the future will not be around long to save our asses anymore - Del Piero, Buffon, Camoranesi, Nedved, TrezeGol...I'm not saying Juve should actively bid players in the transfer market for replacements ATM, but a proper manager would take these things into account and have such a vision for the future.

Sir Alex is an expert at this. It's like he knows the "expiry date" of his players and when it's the exact time to replace them.

Not saying SAF should join Juve lol...just an observation over the years.

 

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So basically it comes down to expectations.

As a very personal opinion, IMHO Juve is performing on par with it's roster. Am I wrong?

I think you are wrong. Juve were underperforming, as per the names on their roster...which as I said earlier is similar (if not identical) to the one which achieved 3rd last season.

I am overrating Juve then?

So 3rd place last year was a fluke?

 

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A puppet...which has the full backing of management, because they decided the [crappy] transfer campaign!

How many 'failed superstar' targets did Juve's management 'achieve':

Pepe (Real Madrid)
Ever Banega (Valencia)
Rafael Van der Vaart (Real Madrid)
Diego (Werder)
Xabi Alonso (Liverpool)
Gabriel Milito (the defender, Barca)

 

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One could argue that if the Agnelli's would write a check in order to sign Kaka, Cristiano Ronaldo, Messi and Ibra, probably Ranieri would not oppose the move :smileani:

later

Didn't Ranieri have such a luxury with Chelsea 2003/2004? And what did he achieve?

 

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Ummm, guys?...Ranieri...winning streak...crap football...the topic? p

 

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ranieri? he will be judged on 2 things - results and performance of the team. If he wins the league or UCL OR fail to qualify for next UCL, its safe to say performance will matter less. If he only Q-fies for UCL, then performance probabbly will be key.

I believe it's a combination of Ranieri and upper management.

The transfer policies + Ranieri's starting 11, preferred players, post match reactions etc.

Under Lippi, when Juventus would lose a match, he would admit defeat, analyze the weakness in his post match comments, and bounce right back gradually in the next games. Look at his results with Juve in Scudetto winning seasons: you'll always find like one month where results were poor, where a tough spell was experienced, but he maintained control afterwards.

Under Capello we were at an airtight midfield + defense...with the inability to create anything beautiful in terms of attacking play.

With Ranieri, the team has some weak links which need to be addressed. His team struggles to form a good attack and keep lot's of ball possession - and when the old brigade players such as Del Piero or Nedved show up that's proving to be the turning point in some of our games. Likewise Amauri has shown up as well, sometimes.

It's not like in August 2008, Juve fans were expecting to win Serie A with flying colors; but before the winning streak we noticed some loss of control over the team. There was an injury crisis, and on top of that the cards were played wrong during the games.

Agreed with earlier comments that he shouldn't be axed now - because we don't need imbalance in the team.

But in terms of Cobolli's long-term-we're-building-a-team-to-win-Serie-A-project...I don't see this vision being fulfilled at the current rate.