Juventus Win 2-1 at AZ Alkmaar Despite Playing Second Fiddle for Long Stretches
SportSignals Match Desk · Football analysis desk ·
Juventus left Alkmaar with a 2-1 Europa League win on Thursday night. It was not pretty. It was not convincing. But it is the results business, and they got the result. That is what matters.
The Basics Won It
The thing is, AZ were the better side by most measures on the night. They had 56 percent possession. They had 18 total shots to Juventus's nine. They created more dangerous attacks, won more interceptions, and put in 14 key passes to Juventus's seven. And they lost. That should tell every romantic about this game exactly what football is.
Juventus were clinical in the first half. That is it. That is the whole story. Two chances, two goals. End of.
Koopmeiners Opens the Scoring, Kolo Muani Doubles It
Teun Koopmeiners broke the deadlock on 19 minutes. A left foot shot, assisted by Randal Kolo Muani. The irony was not lost. Koopmeiners, playing against his former countrymen on Dutch soil, put Juventus in front in the opening quarter of the game.
Then Kolo Muani turned from provider to scorer. He put the ball in the net on 37 minutes, also with his left foot, with Nick Woltemade picking up the assist. Two goals from their two most dangerous attacking players. Simple. Executed. No fuss.
AZ had no answer to it at the time. They were creating attacks. They were moving the ball. But desire and execution are different things, and in those two moments before half-time, Juventus showed more of both.
AZ Were the Better Team and Still Lost
Listen, I am not going to dress this up. AZ were excellent in large portions of this match. They had 51 dangerous attacks to Juventus's 27. They blocked 11 shots. They made 18 tackles. Their passing accuracy was 90 percent. They competed. Full credit for that.
But they went in 2-0 down at half-time. All that possession and pressure counted for nothing because when it mattered in the final third, they could not finish. They had one big chance created all night. One. Juventus had none, technically, and still scored twice. That is the difference between a team that is organised and a team that is merely busy.
The substitutions at the hour mark tell their own story. AZ brought on Jordy Clasie, Elijah Dijkstra, and Kees Smit simultaneously on 63 minutes. Wholesale changes from a manager looking for something different. It showed desperation more than it showed tactical clarity.
The Discipline Problem That Could Have Cost Juventus
Juventus were not without their own issues on the night. They committed 20 fouls, which is too many. Andrea Cambiaso picked up a yellow card just three minutes into the second half, for a foul at that, and was substituted off on 60 minutes along with his booking. Juan Cabal came on as his replacement and then picked up a yellow himself deep in injury time. Jeff Ekhator, on as a substitute from the 78th minute, was booked on 85 minutes. Three yellow cards for a team supposedly managing a game. That is unacceptable. You cannot control a match from a position of numerical risk.
The thing is, Juventus had the lead and kept fouling. Twenty fouls in a Europa League away game when you are two goals up is not game management. It is a lack of accountability. Someone in that dressing room needed to say enough.
Meerdink Gives AZ Late Hope
Mexx Meerdink pulled one back for AZ in the 88th minute. Left foot shot, assisted by Elijah Dijkstra, one of the substitutes brought on at 63 minutes. Credit to AZ for not giving up. Credit to the fans for staying with their team.
But by that point, the game was gone. Three minutes of hope does not change a 90-minute performance. AZ had the ball all night and created next to nothing of real quality until it was already too late. That is on the players in the final third. You have to take your chances when the game is there to be won, not when it is there to be lost with a little less embarrassment.
What Juventus Did Well
Away from home in Europe, against a side with more of the ball, Juventus made their shots count. They had two saves from their goalkeeper. They won 10 of their 16 tackle attempts. They completed 10 successful dribbles to AZ's one. When they needed to be direct, they were. When they needed to be disciplined in defence, they mostly were.
Bremer came on in the 79th minute to replace Federico Gatti, presumably to shore things up at the back after the late AZ pressure began to build. Douglas Luiz came on in the 85th minute for Kolo Muani. Both changes had a logic to them. Protect the lead. See it out. That is accountability in action from the bench.
AZ Have Questions to Answer
AZ go into this defeat having won two of their previous three Europa League matches, including a 4-0 win over Ararat-Armenia and a 2-1 win over Hapoel Be'er Sheva. They are not a bad side. But they had five players unavailable through injury or suspension coming into this game, and it showed in the moments that mattered. You cannot carry that kind of absentee list and expect your finishing to be sharp.
The standards were there in terms of work rate. The attitude in terms of effort was there. But in a results business, effort only gets you so far. AZ competed. They just did not win. And there is no comfort in the statistics when you are sitting in the dressing room having lost at home.
Verdict
Juventus 2-1. The right result for the away side, even if the performance did not fully justify it. Koopmeiners and Kolo Muani did their jobs. The rest of the squad let discipline slip more than once. AZ will look back at this and know they should have taken something from it. They did not. That is football.
