In recent months, Vlahovic has made a much bigger impact at Juve but on his own he has never been able to drag the team along: he is not a top-player.
Former Bologna, Marseille and Atletico Madrid defender Stefano Torrisi spoke to the microphones of TvPlay, explaining that from his point of view Dusan Vlahovic is not a striker on the level of the great top-players who have worn the Juve jersey in his time.
One who always impressed Torrisi was Bobo Vieri. “Bobo was one of the strongest center forwards in the world, a mixture of Lukaku and Haaland. Structured like Lukaku, but with more technique: if he shot with his eyes closed, he would get the goal. Like Inzaghi was great at staying on the offside line, he was great at feeling the goal. He was tough.”
“Football has changed a lot, Haaland is embedded in a perfect system of play, and in City he has to adapt his game to the characteristics of the other players. Bobo and his teammates followed the tactical settings of the time, and so he, for example, would make do and even score goals on his own, winning games independently.”
Something that players like Vlahovic cannot do instead. “Haaland is strong, maybe he also has these qualities, but it is seen less, because in City he is a finisher.” According to Torrisi there was only one stronger than Vieri in Serie A. That was Ronaldo. “In Bologna he scored a goal for us after receiving the ball and with a feint that sent all of us defenders into the stands. The Fenomeno was one of the few stronger than Vieri, thinking back to those of the time. I then never tagged Ibrahimovic, for example, or Cristiano Ronaldo. But in my time there was so much quality: Batistuta, Crespo, Trezeguet… Today the forwards in Italy are certainly less strong. The problem is economic.”
The interviewee pointed out that the Italian market is now almost entirely “internal”: strong teams take players from those who show off in the small or mid-table teams. “And so Fiorentina sells Vlahovic for 70 million. At the time I don’t know if someone like him would have been a first choice for Juve. Vlahovic is still not a top-player. “
Vlahovic struggles: “He is not a top-player and Allegri is not helping him “
According to Torrisi, Vlahovic still has a lot of quality and is young, so in the future he could also turn into a real top-player. But not at Juve. “In Juve maybe he struggles more. Although I like Allegri, it should be acknowledged that as a coach he uses a less set system of play than other teams. That is why Vlahovic cannot express himself at his best. Today if we look in Europe, however, there are definitely other strikers stronger than him. “
“I, too, thought that not making cups was an advantage. But, no one wants to blame me, I think Juve’s squad is definitely inferior to Inter’s, as well as all the others. Milan is also a more broken team. I think Juve is where it needs to be, which is third.”
Among Serie A defenders, the interviewee said he has seen at least three or four players of great depth. “I really like Calafiori, a player who has important qualities, if he arrived as a second-tier player now he definitely belongs in the first tier in Europe. He is a central defender who has leg, he has insertion, he has construction from the bottom, the right timing … he is a modern player. “