CHAMPIONS LEAGUE: AS ROMA (article available in Spanish)

After the Fenerbahçe´s analysis, now it is time to do the same with AS Roma, which is going to play an exciting first knockout round against another classic of world,the Spanish giant, Real Madrid. We will watch games with many equality, cause both teams have a good squad. Nevertheless, we think that Real Madrid is the favourite in order to play next round, since the Italian team has a weaker defensive line, and it is sure that Real Madrid´s forwards will make use of this factor.

As we say, we believe that the AS Roma´s defensive aspect is the worst of this “squadra”-it has actually received 22 goals in 22 Seria A´s games and 6 goals in 6 Champions League´s games-, and this is because it does not have an excellent goalkeeper, since Doni is not the adequate goalkeeper for a top team at this moment, since he has not the necessary safety and sobriety, that a top team needs. Of course he has not committed big mistakes like his compatriot, Dida-finally Ancelotti has taken a good decision and now Kalac is the first goalkeeper of the team-, but we think that AS Roma needs another goalkeeper if it wants to be a competitive team. Moreover, the Brazilian goalkeeper is not helped by his defensive line, because players such as the irregular Matteo Ferrari, the young Portuguese Antunes, the offensive right back Cicinho are quite erratic and unreliable, and they can show the best or the worst during a game. However, if we talk about defensive irregularity, we must speak about an overvalued central defender, the French Philippe Mexès. Sincerely, I do not know why he has a “big name”, because since his Auxerre´s period, he has shown what he is, he is a player with great technique and “ball´s control”, but he is extremely soft -as another French player, Benoit Pedretti, who was considered as a future “star” some years ago-, and a central defender can have many quality, but of course it is essential that he is a strong and tough player, because otherwise a team can be in the same situation as AS Roma-1 goal received per game and it has not won any game played against a top team during this season like Juventus, Inter, Fiorentina and Manchester United ( the only exception is the victory against AC Milan in October, but it is not remarkable, because AC Milan did not win any Serie A ´s game in San Siro during that period)-. So, we suppose that Luciano Spalleti,with this background, will trust in players with experience and defensive rigour as Max Tonetto, Cassetti and Christian Panucci, who is playing a good level with Roman team and with Italian National Team-he scored the decisive goal in the important game between Italy and Scotland-.Because if Spalleti do not do it,players like Robben, Guti, Raul, Ruud Van Nistelrooy, Wesley Sneijder or Julio Baptista may have many facilities and do much damage.

Instead, Real Madrid must take care with the Roman midfielders, because they are players with a lot of quality, forcefulness and experience. AS Roma is an atypical team, because Spalleti usually plays without a “9” and he uses 6 midfielders, having a powerful line. There are hardworking midfielders like Simone Perrota, the “hard” Daniele De Rossi and Chilean David Pizarro. These three players have the function of contain the rival´s play, but it does not mean that they are players without quality, since they are players with good technique, especially the Chilean Pizarro, who is the playmaker of the team. Alongside these players, Spalleti have many options, but he usually opts for the Mancini´s skill-this player began his career as a right back and now he plays as left winger, although he sometimes plays as a right winger or central offensive midfielder- and for the quality and mobility of the Brazilian Rodrigo Taddei-who has a big name in the Italian Serie A after good seasons at Siena-and of course for the great Francesco Totti, who brings 16 seasons at AS Roma, scoring more than 160 goals in Serie A.Totti is simply a brilliant player, he is able to decide a match in any moment. Obviously Sergio Ramos, Pepe, Fabio Cannavaro and Heinze should take care of the actions of this marvellous player. In the bench, Luciano Spalleti has good players as the French right winger Ludovic Guily, the central midfielder Aquiliani or the right midfielder Matteo Brighi.

Lastly, we must speak about the Roman attack,since although Luciano Spalleti prefers to play without a “9”,as I said before, it does not mean that the Roman´s strikers are bad, since AS Roma has 2 very interesting players: Mauro Esposito and Mirko Vucinic. Esposito, who is a player of the Italian National Team, is a player with great mobility and he arrived to AS Roma after he played good seasons at Cagliar(at the time it was a rumour about the possible interest of FC Barcelona about this player.The Montenegrin Mirko Vucinic is a player, who had an excellent work at Lecce, but here in Roma, he has not shown his potential and he has scored only 4 goals in 2 seasons.But he is a good and young player,and we believe that he will be a key player very soon. To Sump up, AS Roma has good midfielders, but we will see whether it will be enough to compensate for its defensive problems and thus be able to defeat Real Madrid- the Spanish team is in an excellent moment and it have, possibly, the best goalkeeper of the work at this moment, Iker Casillas, who compensates the mistakes of the Real Madrid´s defensive midfielders-the irregular Mamadou Diarra and the slow Fernando Gago-.
Cheers,
J&F