We’re finally in the “real” part of summer. You know, the part where players actually been able to go on vacation and everyone (fans included) get a short yet much-needed break from football.
While you might frown at my use of the term “much-needed break,” I think it’s important for both players and fans to take a break from the beautiful game sometimes. The football industry — a term that I unfortunately have to use here — has become absolutely relentless as FIFA, UEFA, and the powers that be do
everything they can to cram as many games onto the calendar as possible.
As a result, we’ve become a bit overloaded by football.
Personally, I find it refreshing to take a break for a month or so from the game (during the summer) to focus on/think about other things. Frankly, I become a bit burned out from football when it’s non-stop, 12 months of the year as it is currently trending to become. So, friends, remember that there’s a time for everything and that it’s ok to take a break sometimes.
Alright, now that we have that “Eat, Pray, Love” moment out of the way, let’s review last month’s action.
Transfers
There was no action on the pitch as Juventus crashed out of the Club World Cup (CWC) after losing 1-0 to Real Madrid in the Round of 16. I wrote about the CWC in last month’s recap; the club earned a cool €32 million from participating in the competition. There was also little action off the pitch as Juventus was remarkably quiet in the transfer market (we talked about this issue on a recent podcast episode). Here’s a summary of the month’s transfer activity:
- The big news of the month came early in July: Juventus signed Canadian striker Jonathan David on a free transfer (but, as every economist knows, there’s no such thing as a free lunch) from French side Lille. His transfer fuels the rumors that at least one of Arek Milik, Dusan Vlahovic, or Randal Kolo Muani will not be at the club next season. Regarding Kolo Muani, talks between Paris Saint-Germain and Juventus are at a bit of a stalemate, though PSG may agree to a deal soon.
- Speaking of strikers, it looks like Vlahovic is the most likely of the three aforementioned strikers to leave the club this summer. There are rumors that could even Juventus will terminate his contract and that the Serbian striker will join Max Allegri’s AC Milan, but he also may run out his contract and leave on a free next summer. It’s a sad state of affairs for a player who was supposed to be one of Juve’s most important players for the last few years.
- After being linked with a move to Nottingham Forest, it looks like winger Timothy Weah will join French side Olympique Marseille. Unfortunately, Weah and his agent are not too happy about Juventus’ behavior during these negotiations. Based on how the club has conducted itself the last few years off the pitch, I’m honestly not surprised by these comments.
- There are two transfer rumors that seem to pop up almost every summer. The first is Juventus placing Weston McKennie on the transfer market. It’s the most nonsensical and yet persistent rumor of the last few years. Despite being linked to a departure every summer, McKennie continues to be one of the most consistent and reliable central midfielders in the team. The second is Juventus being interested in Manchester United winger Jadon Sancho. It’s unlikely that anything concrete will come of this, but we’ll keep an eye on this one for you.
- While one winger might be joining, another might be leaving. Atalanta and a few clubs in Saudi Arabia are interested in signing Nico González. For Atalanta, much depends on if Inter successfully sign their Nigerian striker Ademola Lookman. At the moment, those negotiations are at a stalemate.
- Off the pitch, Juventus confirmed that
Bond-villain lookalikeFrançois Modesto is the club’s new technical director. He was previously the sporting director of recently-relegated Monza from the summer of 2022 till the end of last year. Meanwhile, former Juventus head of scouting Matteo Tognozzi is reportedly close to becoming the club’s new sporting director. He would replace Cristiano Giuntoli. - In a flurry of activity, Juventus announced that Federico Gatti has extended his contract through 2030, we have signed Francisco Conceição on a permanent deal from Porto (also through 2030) for a hefty €30.4 million, and sold Samuel Mbangula to Werder Bremen for €10 million plus another potential €2 million in bonuses.
- In one of the more bizarre transfers in recent Juventus history, the club sold promising full back Alberto Costa to Porto for €15 million, a mere six months after signing him, and purchased attacking fullback/wingback João Mário for €11.4 million, also from Porto. Just when Costa seemed to be settling in well in Turin, off he goes back to Portugal.
- Douglas Luiz was absent from the start of Juventus’ preseason training sessions and will likely be sold to a club in the Premier League.
- Speaking of the Premier League, the Bianconeri reportedly rejected an offer from Chelsea of around €70 million for Kenan Yildiz. As we all know, Chelsea has a bizarre habit of buying as many forwards as they can and then selling half of them off the next year after barely playing them.
Un-creative accounting
No matter how much I think about it, I simply do not understand the reason for the Alberto Costa-João Mário deal. It seems very strange to me to trade a promising fullback who seemed to have the skills we needed in that position — physically strong and tall with balanced defensive and offensive skills — for a fullback who started as a right winger and emphasizes his attacking skills over his defensive ones.
“The fans can expect an attacking player who enjoys creating chances, providing assists, and scoring some goals if possible. And that’s what I hope to give.” — João Mário
I know what you’re thinking. Costa has only played a handful of games so the sample size is too small to make a judgment on his skills. This is absolutely true. However, besides his poor performance against Manchester City at the CWC (a game in which the entire team was thoroughly outclassed), he seemed to show signs of at least prioritizing his defensive duties over his offensive ones.
At 21 years of age, he also still has a lot of time to grow (granted, at the moment I do rather have more experienced players rather than “potential,” so perhaps that is a negative for Costa). Furthermore, as I mentioned above, it’s extremely telling that 25-year-old Mário emphasized his attacking abilities over his defensive ones.
Now, I know that I’m biased against “modern” fullbacks: i.e. the ones that attack first and defend later. I admit that for certain teams that simply works the best and yields great results. But Juventus is not that type of team (at least, not now). Perhaps if the Thiago Motta experiment had continued/succeeded, that could have been the case but even then I don’t think Motta was a coach that wanted fullbacks that relentlessly attacked and occasionally defended.
So I’m not really sure what the justification for this move is from a sporting perspective. Unfortunately, it makes even less sense from a financial perspective as shown by the following statement:
“The aforementioned transactions result in a monetary balance to be received by Juventus - based on the differential in fixed consideration and some ancillary expenses - amounting to ca. €3 million.”
All of that for a mere €3 million?
I’m not asking for a superstar defender from this deal. All I want for Christmas is a fullback who can defend well, prioritizes defending, and can maybe sometimes give the team an assist and/or goal. I was reasonably confident that Costa could provide that but now we’re back to the uncertainty of seeing if a new player can settle in quickly enough and provide the team those skills.
July Highlight
Shout out to Tito from the Viola Nation website and Danny for a wonderful interview/analysis of the rise and fall of Dusan Vlahovic. It was great reading about Vlahovic from a different perspective to help understand what went wrong (and right) for the player in the last five years or so of his career. Make sure to check it out if you haven’t already!
More from blackwhitereadallover.com:
- Juventus 1 - AC Milan 0: Initial reaction and random observations
- Supercoppa Italiana Game Time Thread: Juventus vs. AC Milan
- Allegri: Supercoppa is good practice to prepare for Champions League
- Report: Aaron Ramsey to sign his contract with Juventus on Friday
- Report: Juventus, Chelsea agree to 18-month Higuain loan deal
- Report: Gonzalo Higuain officially hands in transfer request to Milan management
- Boxing Day disaster in Serie A: Thoughts on Italy’s ongoing racism issue
