As Luciano Spalletti heads into his second game as Juventus manager, he can still count on one hand how many training sessions he has had with his new club. The simple fact of when he took over for Igor Tudor and how unrelenting the schedule can be for a club playing domestically and in Europe means that new managers are simply thrown right into without much time to actually train the squad that they have taken over.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
Spalletti got the domestic debut with Juve out of the way over the weekend. Now, it\u2019s time for him to make his return to the Champions League with his new squad that has \u2014 gasp! \u2014 suddenly won back-to-back games.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
It comes at a time in which Juventus need points in Europe in the worst possible way. The Bianconeri enter Matchday 4 of the UCL league phase on the outside looking in of the play-off round qualification places. That is not a mistake \u2014 if the league phase had ended after three games, Juve wouldn\u2019t even have the chance to try and get into the Champions League Round of 16, with their current standing of 25th place meaning they\u2019re the first club out on the cutting room floor. So as Portuguese side Sporting make their way to Turin, the need for three points in Europe is feeling especially important \u2014 especially with everything that has happened ever since Juve\u2019s last Champions League fixture two weeks ago in Spain.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
Spalletti can still count how many training sessions he\u2019s had with his new team, yet he\u2019s about to take control of hs second game come Tuesday night. And as much as the debut against Cremonese was important, this one might be even more of the case or else Juve\u2019s situation in the Champions League will be looking even the more dire than it already is after losing to Real Madrid. Juventus are in 25th place \u2014 right outside of the play-off spots that take up ninth through 24th. Sporting, in a much more favorable spot, sit 14 places above Juve after claiming a win over Marseille two weeks ago.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
Meeting Sporting was always going to be viewed as a tough challenge even with it being in Turin. But now, with Juve\u2019s form in Europe and just overall before Spalletti\u2019s arrival, takes on an even great task for the new Bianconeri boss.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
In his career, Spalletti doesn\u2019t have what some would call a \u201cgood\u201d record in the Champions League. He\u2019s managed 67 games in Europe\u2019s premier club competition, but has only won 29 of them and lost 23, gaining an average of 1.52 points per match. That\u2019s \u2026 not great.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
Spalletti\u2019s most recent season in the Champions League coincided with his title-winning season with Napoli. They advanced to the UCL quarterfinals, only to fall to Serie A rival AC Milan. In that season, Napoli was one of the more impressive squads in Europe, with Spalletti winning seven of the 10 games Napoli played. It was also the furthest a Spalletti-coached team had advanced in the Champions League since his Roma squad made the quarterfinals in the 2027-08 campaign.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
Juventus might not be hoping for those immediate kind of results considering he\u2019s been on the job for less than a week as he prepares to face Sporting, but the view is that getting into a much more comfortable position in Europe over the next month or two is possible.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
That means it has to start against Sporting and at least get to a point where Juventus has more points in Europe compared to games played this season. They\u2019re sitting on two points in three games so far, with zero wins to their name. That\u2019s worse than what Thiago Motta did to start the European campaign last season \u2014 and we know how that run in the Champions League ended up going.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
Spalletti was pleased with his team\u2019s effort against Cremonese, one of Serie A\u2019s biggest early-season surprises. But he was also quick to say after Saturday night\u2019s win just how much there is to still improve \u2014 which is a given or else he probably wouldn\u2019t be in this position and hired by Juventus in the first place. He pretty much reaffirmed those thoughts during Monday\u2019s pre-match conference.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
\n\u201cI\u2019m pleased with the choices made in Cremona, because I got responses that allow me to work better with the guys. Tomorrow evening it will be a complicated match, they have a group that knows how to play football well, they know how to stay on the pitch: they often change roles and tasks during the match and they have a lot of quality in tight spaces in the attacking third.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<\/div>\n
\nA win in Spalletti\u2019s debut was important \u2014 and nobody more than the new Juve coach himself will tell you that. The winless streak was put to bed at midweek, but a second straight win and Spalletti arriving and donning his nice new Armani suit has helped this squad start to rid itself of what has happened over the previous two months. Of course, more dropped points against Sporting might have us saying otherwise, but Spalletti does recognize that a win over Cremonese is something good to build off of now that the squad shifts its attention back to European play.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
\nAnd if things go the way they did over the weekend, then Juve could actually get their first European win of the season \u2014 which, considering it\u2019s now November, probably needs to happen soon no matter who is manager.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
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- The good news from the final training session before Sporting arrives in Italy: Kenan Yildiz is back with the rest of the group and Spalletti confirmed at his pre-match press conference that Juve\u2019s No. 10 is available to play on Tuesday night.<\/span><\/li>\n
- The other new injury that was forced to miss the trip to Cremona over the weekend, defender Lloyd Kelly, was not part of Monday\u2019s training session and is a major doubt to face Sporting.<\/span><\/li>\n
- The other injured players are no surprises: Gleison Bremer, Juan Cabal and Carlo Pinsoglio. (Remember, Arek Milik is not part of the squad for the UCL league phase, but is still injured because of course he is.)<\/span><\/li>\n
- With Kelly likely to be unavailable, Tuen Koopmeiners is expected to play in the back three once again just as he did in the win over Cremonese. (That is not something I expected to type a week ago, people. Seriously, had no idea at all.)<\/span><\/li>\n
- Spalletti admitted just how important the wins over Udinese and Cremonese were from a mental standpoint, saying: The two wins that these boys earned on their own in recent days allow us to face a great team like Sporting CP with a different spirit.\u201d<\/span><\/li>\n
- Spalletti said Dusan Vlahovic currently has \u201ca bit of an advantage\u201d over the other strikers on the roster \u201cbecause he knows what\u2019s expected here at Juventus when you step onto the pitch wearing this jersey.\u201d<\/span><\/li>\n
- Juventus and Sporting last played each other during the knockout round of the Europa League in 2023.<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/div>\n
\nIt\u2019s been a while since we\u2019ve talked about a certain Dutchman in relatively positive terms. But coming out of Juventus\u2019 win over Cremonese at the weekend, I feel like we can maybe do that again even with the incredibly small sample size.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
\nCould Luciano Spalletti have maybe figured something out when it comes to Teun Koopmeiners? Considering all that he\u2019s been through since coming to Juventus late last summer and the simple price tag that is attached to his name every time it\u2019s brought up, let\u2019s sure as hell hope so.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
\n\n\n\n\n<\/a><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\nAFP via Getty Images<\/cite><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
\nSpalletti discovered something in playing Koopmeiners as a very deep-lying playmaker that is in the back three. The thinking behind it was that as Khephren Thuram went on his forward runs, Koopmeiners would be able to fill that space and utilize his strengths to his advantage rather than being shoehorned into positions further up the field like Thiago Motta and Igor Tudor did in his first 16 months at Juventus.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
\nFor one game, at least, it worked.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
\nAnd with Kelly out injured, we\u2019re likely to see it again.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
\nIt\u2019s the biggest tactical twist that Spalletti has made during his extremely short time at Juventus thus far. Was something like this expected right off the block? No, not at all. Guessing the amount of people who were expecting Koopmeiners to line up in Juventus\u2019 back three against Cremonese can be counted with both hands and that\u2019s it. Hell, when I first saw the formation update in the early minutes of Saturday night\u2019s game on WhoScored, I thought their technology was a bit drunk and there was a glitch in things. There wasn\u2019t.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
\nPlaying Koopmeiners deeper in midfield \u2014 or, in this case, in defense \u2014 is something Spalletti specifically pointed out during his introductory press conference last week. Maybe we should have keyed in on it a little bit more as a hint to what he was thinking for the weekend, but nobody was really thinking it outside of him recognizing the Dutchman\u2019s talents. Now, we\u2019re all waiting to see what he can do in the backline once again.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
\nOh, it\u2019s funny how things change so quickly sometimes, right? Koopmeiners potentially being important as a defender<\/em><\/strong> is certainly nobody had on their bingo card for this season, let alone with Spalletti calling the shots and doing it right out of the gate as manager.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
\nContinue to make it look like a smart decision, Teun. Pleasant surprises are always welcome around here.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
\nWhen: <\/strong>Tuesday, Nov. 4, 2025.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
\nWhere:<\/strong> Juventus Stadium, Turin, Italy.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
\nOfficial kickoff time:<\/strong> 9 p.m. local time in Italy and across Europe, 8 p.m. in the United Kingdom, p.m. Eastern time, 2 p.m. Central time, 1 p.m. Pacific time.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
\nTelevision:<\/strong> TNT Sports 4 (United Kingdom); Sky Sport Uno, Sky Sport 252 (Italy).<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
\nOnline\/Streaming:<\/strong> Paramount+<\/strong><\/a>, Amazon Prime Video (United States); DAZN Canada; fuboTV Canada; Amazon Prime Video; Fubo Sports Network Canada (Canada); Sky Go Italia (Italy).<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
\nOther live viewing options can be found here<\/strong><\/a>, and as always, you can also follow along with us live and all the stupid things we say on Bluesky<\/strong><\/a>. If you haven\u2019t already, join the community<\/strong><\/a> on Black & White & Read All Over, and join in the discussion below.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n