Juventus trying to ruin another summer with an awful August

We’ve been down this road before with Juventus.

Last summer Juventus had a July to remember when they brought in Cristiano Ronaldo, Emre Can, Mattia Perin, and Joao Cancelo and made Douglas Costa’s stay in Torino permanent. They looked to be on the path back to Champions League contender status and were still rumored to be looking to sign the midfielder the squad had been missing since Paul Pogba’s departure. What we got instead was an absolutely disastrous month of August.

It started with Juventus swapping Mattia Caldara, who was a promising prospect, for a declining traitor in Leonardo Bonucci. Along with this deal, Juve sent Gonzalo Higuain on a loan to rival AC Milan. The move did very little to help Juventus and in fact may have weakened the squad because it eventually led to the departure of Medhi Benatia in January. To make matters worse, Juventus had previously turned down an offer for Chelsea to buy both Higuain and Daniele Rugani, which should have been Juve’s preference at the time. Now it looks even worse for Juve that they turned down the offer (which was rumors to be in the range of 80 million euros) as Rugani has looked like he’ll never be more than a rotational option, Milan backed out of the loan after half of a season and now Juventus can’t seem to get rid of Higuain, and Juve has already found a replacement for Bonucci in the starting lineup.

Then Juventus made matters worse and mutually agreed to part ways with Claudio Marchisio, a fan favorite who looked to still at least be able to contribute to a very shallow midfield. Letting him leave while Sami Khedira was still a part of the team’s plans and after Gianluigi Buffon had already left in the same summer was simply a bad look for Juventus.

We saw the results of these moves this season. An early exit from the Champions League that would’ve been earlier if not for an incredible comeback, the first season since 2013-14 where Juventus didn’t win the domestic double, and a season full of uninspiring performances. Now they look destined for a repeat with an August full of mistakes.

The first of those mistakes appears to already be a done deal with Moise Kean having already completed his medical at Everton. It has become an incredibly rare feat for a player to go from Juve’s youth ranks to the squad’s starting lineup and even more rare for that player to be successful for the club. Marchisio is the last example I could think of that was truly successful at Juventus (Sebastian Giovinco has looked great elsewhere, but struggle during his time with Juve). Moise Kean looked poised to be the player that stopped that trend.

It is one of the things that really separates Juventus from the rest of the world’s top teams. Juve rarely has home-grown players in its lineup. Once Kean is gone the only player left who has made it from the youth squad to the senior squad will be Carlo Pinsoglio. That’s right, the only home-grown player at the best club in Italy will be the 3rd string goalkeeper. No other top team can say that right now. Barcelona has a world-famous youth academy. The defending world champions started a home-grown player in the Champions League final, had another on the bench, and now have a third in their squad. PSG and Real Madrid are both constantly criticized for trying to buy titles, but even they have regular starters who came from their academies.

It should be clear why it is beneficial to hold onto these players when they display the talent to break into the squad. It is easier to hold onto a player when they feel that connection of having always been with a squad. More importantly, they don’t require a transfer fee, which opens up funds to strengthen other spots in the lineup. Unfortunately, it seems like Juventus would rather blow money on the next mistake than hold onto Kean.

That next mistake is their attempts to swap Paulo Dybala for Romelu Lukaku. I’m sure by now you are all aware that I want Juventus to sell Paulo Dybala. I’ve been pushing for this sale since before the first article I wrote about it last fall. The fact of the matter is that he just doesn’t fit at Juventus anymore and will only see his value decrease more as he continues to struggle. That doesn’t mean I want this move to happen at all.

Romelu Lukaku’s fit at Juventus isn’t any better than Paulo Dybala’s. Maurizio Sarri’s style of play requires the ability to pass quickly and some modicum of ball control. You’re not gonna find that with Lukaku. No player who has YouTube videos dedicated to his awful first touch will ever fit into Sarri ball. Yes, he would be a big target for Juve’s talented wings to send crosses in to, but that isn’t the type of player that has succeeded under Sarri. Dries Mertens, Lorenzo Insigne, and Jose Callejon are all smaller players who rely on ball skills and movement to succeed. Gonzalo Higuain also isn’t a player who plays big and instead does well holding the ball up and finishing moves from the middle. In spite of the criticism of Sarri at Chelsea last season, Eden Hazard had an incredible season with Sarri as his manager last season. Lukaku has nothing in common with any of these players.

I’m absolutely fine with Dybala being sold to Manchester United, but not in exchange for Lukaku.

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Selling Dybala outright could help keep Kean at Juventus or even open funds for one more high level midfielder. Instead Juve is apparently going to spend their money on a striker who struggles with his control and just had the second worst season of his career.

Even after all that, Juventus has one more mistake they are trying to make before the transfer window closes. That mistake is selling Joao Cancelo to Manchester City (possibly for Danilo and cash). You could argue that Joao Cancelo was the best right back in Serie A last season and he is still young enough that he might not have even reached his peak yet. The Juventus attack simply looked different when he played and he ended up being a huge difference maker when Juve needed a comeback against Atletico Madrid.

Juventus has claimed that their intent is to win a Champions League trophy right now and Ronaldo even came out recently and said they’ll win it either this year or next year. Maybe it’s just me, but selling a player like Cancelo to one of the favorites to win the Champions League doesn’t seem like the type of you make when you’re trying to win right now. Selling Cancelo to to City would only serve to strengthen a competitor while weakening Juve.

Yes, Mattia De Sciglio has looked good in the preseason, but we saw last season that he clearly doesn’t offer the attacking talent that Cancelo does. To make matters worse, Juve might not even be selling Cancelo outright, but instead could be getting Danilo and cash. Danilo has never been anything more than a backup at Real Madrid or Manchester City and there is no reason to believe he would be anything more than an option to rotate De Sciglio at Juventus that will cost them at least 25 million euros that could be used elsewhere or to bring in a better right back. There is absolutely no reason that Juventus should make this move and if it is required because they’re spending on Lukaku then that just makes it even worse.

When Juventus signed Matthijs de Ligt I didn’t think there was anything they could do to ruin this transfer window, especially after they had already brought in Aaron Ramsey, Adrien Rabiot, Merih Demiral, and Cristian Romero, but they are absolutely doing everything they can to waste what was a great month of July.