Stop blaming Ronaldo exit for Juventus crisis

Carlo Garganese

• Updated: 23 May 2023 08:54 CDT
• 4 min read

There is a narrative building within the pro-Ronaldo community that the return of Cristiano to Manchester United is the reason for Juventus’ meltdown this season.

The Bianconeri are enduring a historically bad campaign. They are eighth in Serie A, having won just six of their 14 Serie A games. They are 11 points off the top of the table and seven off the top four. Qualification for next season’s Champions League is already looking unlikely.

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This week they were humiliatingly thrashed 4-0 by Chelsea at Stamford Bridge in the Champions League in a game that demonstrated just how far they have fallen. On Saturday they lost 1-0 at home to Atalanta.

The horde of Ronaldo supporters claim that if their idol was still in Turin that Juventus would not be in meltdown.

The truth is that, yes, Ronaldo would help Juve’s dire situation to an extent. The Bianconeri have struggled horribly to create and score goals since his exit.

They have just 18 goals in 14 Serie A matches. You have to go down to 13th in the table to find a team with less goals scored. Champions Inter have scored 34, Milan have 30, while Atalanta and even little Verona have 28 each in what has becoming the highest-scoring major league in Europe.

With 29 league strikes last season, Ronaldo won the Capocannoniere. Those goals would certainly have earned Juve a few extra points this season.

But, the Old Lady would still be struggling horribly. This is a team that is no better than the one that last season only qualified for the Champions League because Napoli failed to beat Verona on the final day of the campaign. A team that was dumped out of the last 16 of the Champions League by Porto.

Juventus in crisis

As this feature here explains, Juventus are a mess from top to bottom. Their returning manager Max Allegri is playing completely outdated football and has shown so far that he is unable to adapt to modern football. Their president Andrea Agnelli has made a string of errors with his various senior appointments, not to mention his doomed attempt to create a European Super League. Financially, Juventus are a mess and required a €400 million bailout from their parent company Exor this summer. They are also under investigation from the Italian financial police for false accounting.

And, on the pitch, mainly due to a dreadful transfer policy over the last four to five years, Juventus have a team and squad that is miles away from challenging for the Scudetto, let alone the best in Europe.

The presence of Ronaldo would do nothing to make a sub-par midfield of Weston McKennie, Adrien Rabiot and Rodrigo Bentancur Juventus-level players.

He would not be able to make Alvaro Morata clinical in front of goal. He wouldn’t transform Dejan Kulusevski from a €40m flop into a star. Or prevent Paulo Dybala from breaking down with injury every game.

Allegri wouldn’t suddenly learn how to play modern football, or football of any kind that doesn’t involve sticking 10 men in defence and counter-attacking.

Allegri has been a dinosaur this season

-Catenaccio
-No press
-No possession
-Ridiculous 442 with 4 CMs
-Killing Chiesa
-Says defence > attack
-Says mentality > talent
-Says youngsters need to play Serie C before Serie A

Dinosaur views. Needs to evolve fast 🦖 #ChelseaJuventus

— Carlo Garganese (@carlogarganese) November 23, 2021

As we saw at Juventus last season and at Man Utd this term, just because Ronaldo continues to score at a prolific rate, it doesn’t mean that the team as a whole will be successful.

Man Utd are well off the pace in the Premier League with a freescoring Ronaldo, Juventus would still suffer from the same malady if the Portuguese superstar had remained this summer.