In July 2020, Andrea Pirlo was appointed as the new boss of Juventus’ U23s in Serie C. However, merely nine days later, the inexperienced coach was handed an unexpected role as the manager of the Bianconeri’s first team after Maurizio Sarri was dismissed.
A month later, before the new Serie A campaign kicked off, the Italian great received near full marks on his UEFA Pro License thesis where he outlined his philosophy of how the beautiful game should be played.
But being one of the greatest midfielders of his generation holds little weight in football management. Pirlo had a point to prove and wanted to help Juventus to their tenth-straight Scudetto.
Unfortunately, things didn’t quite go to plan despite winning the Supercoppa Italiana and the Coppa Italia. The Old Lady scraped fourth place on the final day of the season and Pirlo was swiftly removed from his post.
Having taken a year’s sabbatical, Pirlo is now back in the dugout, agreeing to become the manager of Turkish side Fatih Karagümrük on a 12-month contract.
The 43-year-old will want to redeem his reputation after a failed spell in Turin but so far has gotten off to a poor start, losing 4-2 at home to Alanyaspor on the opening game week of the Süper Lig.
Nevertheless, there were still some interesting tactical observations from the game in this analysis. This tactical analysis piece will be focused on the tactics used by Pirlo thus far at his new club.
Formation
At Juventus, Pirlo was quite rigid and stubborn with his preferred formation choice, opting for the 4-4-2 in most games. The conventional structure was deployed in 72 percent of the Old Lady’s games during the 2020/21 campaign with the club legend in charge.
Nevertheless, on his competitive debut for Karagümrük, Pirlo set his side up in a 4-1-4-1 formation. In this shape, the manager is able to still have his preferential two banks of four, with an added player in between that plays zonally and marks any players that drop between the lines.
In the match, against Alanyaspor, coached by fellow Italian Francesco Farioli, Pirlo’s side were coming up against an extremely fluid 3-4-3.
