-Couple of thoughts on Salinas, one of the options Utd are linked to at left-back.
-A very interesting profile, but still needs the right environment to take his time and develop properly. But would still be a decent choice as Luke Shaw backup.
Radar from: https://t.co/lkrsKCeLTe
Frosinone 0โ1 Juventus โ the gap wasn't the scoreline, it was the last twenty metres.
Juventus won 1โ0 and won the underlying match with it: 1.97 xG to 0.50, 4 big chances to 0. But the interesting number isn't the total, it's the funnel. Juve reached the final third 41 times and the box 18 โ 44% of entries survived the last twenty metres. Frosinone reached the final third 19 times and the box 8. Territory wasn't the difference; both sides converted box entries into shots at nearly the same rate (Frosinone 50%, Juve 47%). The difference was how often each side got there at all.
That's a progression problem, not a finishing one. 63 progressive passes to 29, and โ more telling โ 14 deep completions to 4. Juve moved the ball through lines; Frosinone moved it around them. A block slides comfortably against circulation. It has to break its own shape when a pass arrives behind a line, and Frosinone only made that happen four times.
The transition data is where I'd start the review if I were on Frosinone's staff. They had MORE broken-play sequences โ 46 to Juve's 34 โ and took 0.12 xG from them against Juve's 0.76. They also won the ball high more often (22 high regains to 13) and counterpressed better (16.0% vs 13.8%). Every pressing board on the page favours Frosinone. Almost none of it was cashed. Regain-to-shot: Frosinone 3.8%, Juventus 9.3% from fewer regains.
That is a press paying in territory and not in threat, and the correction is one action deep. The four seconds after a regain are when the opponent is most stretched, and it's settled by the first pass โ is there a runner beyond the ball, does the first receiver scan before the ball is won, is anyone holding the cut-back lane. Those are rehearsable. Winning the ball 22 times in the opponent's half is a ninety-minute physical cost, and Frosinone paid it in full for 0.12 xG.
Bremer's goal on 22 then split the match into two different games. Juventus while leading: 1.13 xG, 15 shots, 12 box entries. Frosinone while trailing: 0.38 xG, 9 shots, 6 box entries. Any full-match average here is describing two matches added together. Frosinone's possession and pressing totals rise partly out of necessity โ that's chasing, not control.
Shot quality tells the same story at a finer resolution: 0.099 xG per attempt for Juve against 0.045. Frosinone's average shot was worth less than half of Juve's. A side taking low-value attempts usually isn't shooting badly, it's arriving badly โ the correction sits upstream, in the pass before and the movement before that.
One caveat, and it matters. 1 goal came from 2.47 combined xG, and rest-defence vulnerability was identical at 16.7% for both sides (7 dangerous counters conceded by Frosinone, 8 by Juventus). Juve were as loose on the turnover as their opponent โ they were just better at punishing it. Finishing is the noisiest thing in a match and the least likely part to repeat.
Individually: Douglas Luiz was the fulcrum โ 14.51 sequence xT from 36 possessions, 1.05 xGChain, and 0.78 of that surviving as xGBuildup once the shot and the pass before it are stripped out. That's a builder, not a finisher, and goals-and-assists misses all of it. Giacomo Calรฒ led Frosinone on 11.18 sequence xT with 3 key passes and 0 shots โ the involvement was there; the structure ahead of him wasn't.
Frosinone lost this on the pass after the press, not on the press.
https://t.co/YR0i5Rhqff