Political sport and tactics.

In the period from October to November, Roma's results were very good. We finally gave that boost to the championship that brought us from the slums of the standings to third place in Serie A and in the Europa League we are first (Roma 7, Young Boys 4, Cluj 4, CSKA Sofia 1) with overall 5 wins and 2 draws.

Surely now we must not give up, but we must continue to fight to win. We have to keep winning out of respect for our high technical level. Out of respect for our dreams.

The Diawara case, which resulted in a 3-0 win in favor of Verona because the player was on the Under-23 list, caused us a lot of anger, but it must also make us think. Roma had no advantage from this mistake and in the meantime the person responsible for the error (Pantaleo Longo) has become a member of Verona. But now we have to think about it.

Roma is isolated. We are friends of Juventus, but then the others see us as smoke in the eyes and instead at least in Italy it is important to make friends (at least with some other clubs). Political sport, making friends is important in Italy, especially in football.

To make friends, it is important to be present in the League meetings and to make gatherings (in this period with the mask). Bilateral talks that will be very useful if other things like this happen or if there will be complaints about obvious referee errors that disadvantage us. This is essential if we want to fight for the Scudetto also in the future.

Mind you, the value of sporting loyalty, respect for the rules and competitive challenge without cunning remains firmly in me, under the banner of the true competitive spirit but when the others are smart (as Verona probably did) to us detriment a bit 'gnaws my ass.

In any case, I believe the main judge of our season is the field with the sole objective of victory through the tactical factor and in this respect I have made some reflections.

Let's start from the basic principle that if you are too predictable, the opponent studies you, makes you harmless and defeats you, so the two tactics I am going to illustrate are based on a concept: varying the choice.

Roma's main problem is the construction under pressure (a problem that Fonseca's teams have always had since Shakthar Donetsk). To solve it, there are two kind of choices.

Construction 1: the lateral counterattack. The first is a choice that De Rossi naturally took. If a player, without making him notice it, makes the right choice, I do not say it so as not to point it out to the opponent and because I take it for granted that he has understood that it is good. In this situation we have a right defender who passes the ball to the center (therefore towards his left and right for the opponents), the opponents are therefore naturally led to think that our game will develop on our left, their right, and move to the right. At this point the midfielder (but he can also be a defender) notices the movement of the opponents (he can also pretend to pass to the left) and plays it on our right, their left. If you find analogies with the counterattack in tennis, you understand.

Construction 2. 3 playmakers. Let us remember that the best choice under construction is to find the midfielder in the center free, because he has more eye for the game, which is very difficult because usually the opponents press especially in the center. For this, we must go back to 2013-14 and to Garcia who played with 3 very strong midfielders (Strootman-De Rossi-Pjanic), all able to start the maneuver of Rome: they were in practice 3 playmakers (as said at the time the great journalist, Mazzocchi). In this case, we can think of Veretout (Cristante) -Pellegrini (Diawara) -Mkhi. It is important at this stage that the midfielders move, preferably with a rotational movement. This movement should put the opponent's pressure in great difficulty, especially teams like Atalanta who play man by man.

My esteem for Fonseca remains intact. He must have the last word on my tactical reflections and can modify them as he prefers. Fonseca is proving to be an excellent coach. In my small way, I hope that he can win an important cup with Roma already this year. As for the reflections on politics and sports justice, I do not intend to dwell further. We will make the best of a bad situation again, which Roma fans are used to for the love of Roma. The period of October / November was very good. The sensations for this year are good. We always play to win that there is no superior opponent to us, both in Italy and in Europe. Let's go win. Daje Roma!

Giordano Sepi