Managers in Profile - Thiago Motta

All hail Bologna - the TerraMotta Army

This is the second ‘Managers in Profile’, if you want to read the first instalment on Roberto de Zerbi, you can find it here.

Before we get started, it should be noted that Thiago Motta to Juventus seems all but confirmed, so to some of you, a profile on him may seem redundant. However, what the Italian has achieved at Bologna should be celebrated and that is what I will hopefully do in this newsletter.

And who knows? The Juventus board may all simultaneously suffer a concussion and decide not to employ the best Italian manager on the market currently, then other clubs may have a chance to sign him.

We’ve come a long way since Motta was mocked for describing his style of football as 2-7-2; a statement famously taken out of context by football fans looking to reject modernity (he was talking about how a manager sees his team from the sidelines).

Thanks to his management, Bologna will find themselves in the Champions League next season for the first time since the 1964-65 campaign. Whether he is there in person or spirit, he has already cemented his legacy.

But just how has Motta taken this mid-table stalwart to club football’s biggest stage?

Our story does not begin in Bologna but in Liguria in 2019, where Motta started his senior coaching career with Genoa. This was not his first time at the club; he had spent time there during the late 2000s as a player before moving on to Inter Milan and Paris Saint Germain. However, the club he arrived at as a coach was a lot less stable than they were in the late noughties.

As a youth coach at PSG, Motta had tried to implement a plan which saw his teams dominate opponents and take risks in possession, but now taking the step up to first-team level in the Serie, his best laid plans didn’t survive first contact with reality.

Genoa were second to last in the Serie A when he joined in October and they were last when he was sacked in December. It was a difficult job so no one truly blamed Motta for not making a difference, but it did start an important lesson, one that would continue in his next job at Spezia.

Motta replaced Vincenzo Italiano (another excellent Italian manager) as Spezia's manager in July 2021. As if he was trying to outdo the difficulty of his first job, Gli Aquilotti were touted for relegation and facing a potential transfer ban due to financial difficulties, so it was less an uphill battle and rather a climb up Mount Everest for Motta.

Up until December, it looked like the critics would be correct as Motta struggled to make a difference at the Stadio Alberto Picco, but fortunes changed as the club entered the new year. Motta earned the Manager of the Month in January and by the end of the season he had completed the impossible; he saved the club from relegation.

So what was the important lesson that Motta learnt from scrapping at the bottom of the table? Pragmatism.

The Motta that had been forged coaching the PSG youth team was an idealist, stuck in the lab and developing new footballing theories to employ on the football field.

However, staring relegation in the face meant that Motta had to learn the importance of adapting to his situation and the resources available to him. And the genesis of this idea is on full display at Bologna.

Last season Bologna finished 9th in the table with 54 points (14 Wins, 12 draws and 12 losses), this season that has improved with the Rossoblu winning 18 games, drawing 14 and losing five to earn 68 points.

Personally, the more interesting statistic when analysing Motta’s Bologna is the goals scored and goals conceded. In 2022/23, Bologna scored 53 goals and only improved that tally by one goal in 2023/24.

But in terms of their goals conceded, Motta managed to reduce that number from 49 to 30 - the second-best defensive record in the league.

Part of this is due to the outstanding defensive partnership of Riccardo Calafiori (who is likely to be joining Motta in Turin) and Jhon Lucumi, who have been imperious at the back.

Yet even with these two incredible centre-backs, Bologna’s incredible defensive form would be impossible without the structure that Motta has put in place.

Bologna across the 2023/24 campaign have averaged 57.9% possession; they wantd to suffocate their opponent. Though a bad example due to the final result of 3-3, Bologna managed 63% possession against Juventus in their most recent match with the aim of stopping the Bianconeri from playing any football whatsoever.

They usually achieve this by prioritising short meaningful passes in a 4-2-3-1/4-1-4-1 formation, with both the goalkeeper and midfielders being incredibly involved in the build-up from deep.

The players on the wing then spread out wide to create the 2-2 of the 2-7-2, islands which seek to draw out opposing defenders and create avenues to pass into.

This all feeds into a game of patience - Motta’s Bologna slowly creeping forward like a lion stalking its prey, until an opportunity opens up for them to strike. There’s no rushing or unnecessary ceding of possession, just a careful and meticulous ‘onslaught’.

Yet this is only one aspect of their game.

Out of possession, Motta’s Bologna defends in phases. When they initially turnover the ball they try to win it back high and adopt a player marking system to try and pounce on any loose passes or touches when the opponent is put under pressure.

If the opponent can circumvent this, however, pragmatism takes over and Motta’s side drops back into a low block to starve the opposing players of space rather than time.

This constant expansion and contracting of the team makes Bologna incredibly difficult to play against and it has of course seen them climb up the table and take several scalps along the way.

That is why Juventus have made the move for him. Massimiliano Allegri’s style has got results in the past, but now with the possibility of future trophies fading, the grim reality of his football has been laid bare.

(Semi-organised chaos and then Adrien Rabiot stealing a goal in the scramble is alright for a couple of goals, but when it’s your whole strategy it’s not that fun to watch)

His incredibly defensive style may not be the future of Juventus, but the club can not completely pivot away from it. That’s what makes Motta the perfect fit - he understands the importance of creating a stable defensive unit, but he also knows how to construct patterns of play to reliably create chances.

Personally what I find most exciting is the young talent that Motta will have to work with. His coaching has done wonders for the likes of Calafiori, Lewis Ferguson and Joshua Zirkzee just to name a few, and I hope this continues when he has Matias Soule, Kenan Yildiz and Fabio Miretti at his disposal along with Juventus’ other Next-Gen talents.

It should also be noted how Motta has improved players like Ricardo Orsolini (one of my favourite players to watch in the Serie A this season). Before Motta, the winger had never hit double figures in goals in the league, now he’s hit them in back-to-back seasons (11 and 10 retrospectively).

He’s an impressive role player in the same vein as Jose Callejon and Matteo Politano, who were quiet but important members of Napoli’s two famous frontlines of recent times, and as the top-scoring Italian in Europe’s top five leagues this season, he has guaranteed his spot on the plane for Euro 2024.

While it would have been nice to see Motta manage in the Champions League next season (and it will be interesting to see who Bologna brings in to replace him). But if he manages to impart his ideas upon this new project at Juventus, we’ll likely see him back in the competition very soon.

He is still a manager learning his trade, so he will need time. You’d expect that’s something Juventus will give him due to their situation (both on the pitch and financially - sacking Allegri will not have been cheap) but patience is becoming one of football’s rarest commodities.

If everything clicks with Motta at the helm, Juventus could (unfortunately) become one of the most exciting projects in Italy after a few years in the cold.

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