Juventus need to prioritize the Champions League over Serie A

With the Serie A title race still wide open, Juventus should focus on the Champions League, the only trophy that really matters to them this season.

Could the Juventus domination of Serie A come to an end this season? Even so, Juve should be welcoming it. After capturing the scudetto the past eight seasons, Inter Milan, Lazio and even Cagliari are looking to threaten Juve’s stranglehold on the league title.

Nonetheless, Juventus, like so many other elite European clubs, really want to win the Champions League. That’s where there is all the prestige, glory and money. For some players, the Champions League has even replaced the World Cup when measuring success. For example, how else could anyone find Lionel Messi to be among the best when he’s never won a World Cup.

How does a team prioritize the Champions League over their domestic league? It’s not easy. Juve have tried, and failed, throughout much of this decade. So have Bayern Munich and Manchester City just to name two others.

Juve have been praised in the past for fielding full strength, or close to full strength, lineups in all competitions. Why do that? The club didn’t acquire Cristiano Ronaldo two years ago to win another Serie A title. There’s no need for him to be playing week in and week out. He should be saved for the big Serie A games and the Champions League. Couldn’t Paulo Dybala play the majority of your league matches and still come up with wins most of the time?

Same goes for goalkeepers. Juve have two great ones, the veteran Gianluigi Buffon and starter Wojciech Szczesny. There’s no need for Buffon to sit all season. Start the former World Cup champion in most Serie A matches, with the Poland international guarding the posts in big league clashes and the Champions League. Indeed, Juve is so stacked with talent that they could virtually start two separate sides, one in Serie A and the other in Europe, and the team wouldn’t miss much of a beat.

That’s not to advocate for Ronaldo to never play a Serie A match, but why go the whole 90? Why not start Ronaldo for the big league games, say against top-six competition, and have him play just pieces of other matches against easier opponents. The same can be said for several others, including defenders Juan Cuadrado and midfielder Blaise Matuidi.

The aim for Juve is to keep their best players healthy, while also trying to finish top four in Serie A. Manager Maurizio Sarri, however, is known for using the same lineup (or close to it) every week, burning out his best players in a season that could include upwards of 60 matches or more if you account for all competitions. That was Sarri’s biggest criticism when he coached Napoli a few years back.

The defeat last week to Lazio, a 3-1 loss in Rome, allowed Inter Milan to surpass Juventus in the table. It was also the team’s first defeat of the season, although that didn’t stop anyone from sounding the alarm bell that something could be fundamentally wrong with Sarri’s side. Nonetheless, the end of the Champions League group stage and annual Christmas break in Serie A is a great time to re-evaluate the coming months and to devise a plan on how to prioritize one trophy over another.

While Juventus did breeze through the groups stage, the Champions League gets harder in 2020 with the knockout stage. The Italian champions will likely face contenders such as Barcelona either on their way to the final or in the championship game itself.

It isn’t Sarri’s style to prioritize one competition over another. It wasn’t the style that former coach Massimiliano Allegri used either.

Last season’s winners Liverpool, however, give an example of the glory when the Champions League pays off. The Reds won the Champions League and finished second in the Premier League, losing to City by a single point. While Guardiola and his players celebrated another league title, Liverpool and their fans could gloat they were the best in Europe. With Inter Milan now out of the Champions League (they will no doubt prioritize the league race), the time is now for Juve to make a course correction.

There isn’t anything wrong with Juventus. There’s so much going for this team. Not favoring the Champions League, and coming up with a plan to do so, could lead to another predictable finish — first in Serie A and an early exit in the Champions League. That’s the type of repeat performance no one at Juve wants to see this season.