After dropping points against Newcastle Wolves and villa in three of their four games since christmas and only picking up 11 points out of a possible 18 since his arrival, fifth in the league this time, questions are beginning to be asked of Man United interim manager, ralph rangnick. With their goals per game going from 1.7 in the 14 league games prior to his arrival to 1.5 and his six in charge. Despite playing just one top half team and every side in the relegation zone even a drastic improvement in their goals against the game from 1.7 to 0.8 can't overshadow an underwhelming start to life at Old Stafford.
FERNANDO SANTOS
Fernando Santos will always have a special place in the history of portuguese football. An underwhelming career in club management which included spells in charge of the premier league as big three and four stints in greece led to the greek national team job in 2010 and portugal's four years later. Taking over just three months after the assalasa were knocked out of the 2014 world cup at the group stage, Santos deserves credit for steering aside to the 2016 euros and 2019 nations league titles, the first in their history.
But the 2016 triumph was particularly underwhelming. They qualified third from their group after three consecutive draws and won only one game, their semi-final against wales within 90 minutes. Their return of nine goals in seven games four fewer than finalists france and one fewer than wales was disappointing. Goals alone is a very reductive measure of a team's quality however but peer beneath the bonnet and the nature of Santos's sterile football becomes clearer.
Although, Santos is actually reasonably flexible in his approach, often switching between 4-2-3-1, 4-3-3, and 4-1-4-1. He is often criticized for his frequent changes in starting personnel and poor in-game substitutions. Take euro 2020 for example Bruno Fernandez was jettisoned after two fairly average games, despite the fact he contributed 45 goals and assists in 58 games throughout 2021. Whilst Ruben nevers was only given 17 minutes of action whilst the immobile Danilo Pereira started all four games.
Even his talisman Cristiano Ronaldo has scored a ridiculous 66 goals in his last 63 games on de Santos, breaking the international goalscoring record in the process has appeared to lay the blame at his door. Moments after their defeat to Serbia sealed by a late Mitrovic winner, Ronaldo was seen gesticulating on the pitch to his manager clearly devastated by the result.
Unless portugal overturned some serious odds to make qatar santos's conservative cautious reign will come to an end in the meekest of ways.
MASSIMILIANO ALLEGRI
When max allegri was reappointed on the 28th of may 2021 weir football daily were reasonably positive. Not only was the former milan manager returning to a club where he won five consecutive league titles, including four doubles whilst also reaching two champions league finals. But champions into milan had lost the architect of their triumph antonio conte just two days earlier. Following disagreements with the club's hierarchy.
Key players Ashraf Akimi and Romelu Lukaku seria mvp in 2021 would follow him out the door and the advantage appeared to be with the Bianconeri. However, just days before the window closed the playing field was even by Cristiano Ronald, score of 36 percent of Juventus' league goals across his three seasons at the club choosing to return to Man United.
For a squad low on confidence having handed over the Scadetto for the first time in 10 years, who had suffered successive champions league humiliations at the last 16 stage, this was a major blow. But we can't dress it up any other way.
Mass Allegri has also been a huge issue. After two years out in the cold with very little concrete interest from potential suitors, we perhaps shouldn't have been surprised that his tactics and squad management have left a lot to be desired. With an aging backline a litany of underperforming midfielders, no guarantee of regular goals and arguably his most consistent attacking player Paolo Dybala frequently injured, allegri has had his work cut out. But he also hasn't helped himself.
In only one of Juventus's first 12 games the league season did he deviate from 4-4-2. A run that saw them win just five games, all by a single goal margin was tasting defeat four times. By the 6th of November, Juventus were eighth four points off the top four and 14 behind leaders Inter Milan. The only time Allegri's utilized that formation since was against Atalanta, their only defeat in their last 10 games.
In that ronnie is generally utilized 4-2-3-1 or 4-3-3 and the results have been markedly improved with their goals per game going from 1.3 in his first 12 games to 1.8 in their last 10.
As for Allegri star, he's frequently being criticized for being too passive. Despite having some excellent ball players at his disposal such as Locatelli, Bonucci intellect, Juventus have averaged under 54 possession this term only marginally more than rivals Torino and they're lowest since 2010-11.
When they do lose the ball the old lady are perfectly happy to retreat into a mid-block and wait for opposition mistakes. With nine sides in italy and 40 in europe's top five leagues attempting more pressures in the final third than their 678. Having only finished as the league's top scorers once in allegri's five years in charge during his first stint, the old lady faithful weren't expecting crop style entertainment. But to have been outscored by nine teams including employee across the first 22 league games of the season whilst only having the fourth best defense is bitterly disappointing and allegri has to shoulder his share of the blame.