Allegri critical of Juventus ‘frantic’ mentality

Juventus struggled to convert their chances, and were punished yet again this time Sassuolo emerging the victors for the very first time at the Allianz Stadium. The Neroverdi scored at the end of each half, capitalizing on a swift counter attack both times to slice the Juve defence open to leave any Scudetto ambitions in tatters with just over a quarter of the games played.

The fans are certainly losing their patience that Massimiliano Allegri would engineer a quick revival in fortunes after seeing their streak of nine consecutive Scudetti brought to an end last season. The last campaign and this one are starting to look more like those two seasons in the wilderness when the Bianconeri finished seventh in consecutive campaigns, before Antonio Conte returned to Turin after his playing days to drag the club back up from mediocrity to the pinnacle.

Speaking after the defeat, Allegri was disappointed with how easily his side surrendered the winner, getting caught with too many players pushing upfront in search of their own winning goal.

“We should have been more organized, especially at the end of the match. These are games that you can’t lose if you see that you can’t win.

“We must reflect on how we handle games, we can’t concede that goal on a counter-attack. We had several chances to score, but if you are not clinical, everything becomes more difficult.

“Regardless of it, we were too frantic at the end of the match and it can’t happen. It’s not a physical problem, it’s more down to mentality.”

The coach was left pondering what went wrong today compared to Sunday’s Derby D’Italia clash where they had also fallen behind early on and struggled to get the equalizer for the majority of the game.

“We didn’t suffer as much as tonight against Inter on Sunday, we were calmer, tonight we were too frenetic.

“Sassuolo have great technical skills, they play well on the counter-attack.”

The home side were certainly in the ascendancy when midfielder Weston McKennie had tied the game with an excellent header, and were looking more likely to find the next goal but Allegri identified that this squad still doesn’t have the defensive mindset that made his first tenure in Turin so successful.

“We had the momentum on our side. McKennie played a good game, Rodrigo Bentancur has the same characteristics.

“It’s not a problem of players, it’s a problem of mentality. Juventus never concede goals like today, it must not happen again.”