This season promised to be one of change for fans of Serie A. Whilst Juventus still went into the season as firm favourites for the first time they would be moving forward under a new head coach. Massimiliano Allegri made the decision at the end of last season to move on and take a break from top-flight football. The Juventus board immediately turned their attention to the former Napoli coach Maurizio Sarri who was, of course, in charge of Chelsea at the time. Sarri made the move to Turin and many fans of the Italian game were interested to see whether he would immediately install his 4-3-3 model at the club.
Juventus, however, were not the only top Italian side who were coming into this season under a new coach. Another former Chelsea coach would be in charge at Inter Milan with Antonio Conte coming in to take charge. There was no doubting the tactical model that Conte would install with the former Italian national team coach being firmly embedded in his 3-5-2/5-3-2 model. Going into this match the new coach and system was obviously working for the Milan side as they had won all six of their league matches to date.
In this tactical analysis, we will examine the tactical talking points in this match that led to Juventus coming away 2-1 winners. This was largely down to an unexpected structural switch from Sarri.
Team news
There was no surprise from the home side as the lined up in the 3-5-2 structure that we expected. The Uruguayan defender Diego Godin has settled quickly into the team since his summer move from Atletico Madrid. The midfield block is especially impressive for Inter with the former Sassuolo midfielder Stefano Sensi looking extremely strong in the opening matches of the season. In attack, we have seen Lautaro Martinez quickly establish himself as the first-choice partner for Romelu Lukaku.
