Portugal legend Ronaldo moved between multiple attacking positions in his first campaign with Juve, playing on the flanks, through the middle and in partnership with Paulo Dybala. But the 34-year-old is set to initially be given a more defined brief under new boss Sarri, a coach noted for being unfailingly faithful to his favoured 4-3-3 system.
For Ronaldo that means moving slightly wider, to a role he performed with distinction at Manchester United and Real Madrid. “I’m going to first use Cristiano on the left in attack,” Sarri said.
“But really, with the quality he has, he can play anywhere. He’s very experienced and has won everything, individually and collectively.”
Sarri’s first chance to experiment comes against Tottenham in the International Champions Cup in Singapore on Sunday. The Italian confirmed new signing Matthijs de Ligt will “certainly play part of the game” in a bid to quickly integrate the Netherlands international into his new surroundings.
? Singapore! ???
? https://t.co/kehTKbaZSr #MeetTheWonder pic.twitter.com/QJq8B6kUqt
— JuventusFC (@juventusfcen) July 20, 2019
De Ligt, 19, signed from Ajax this week in an €85.5million ($136m American Dollars) deal despite reported interest from Barcelona, Paris Saint-Germain and Manchester United. The defender denied being swayed by the wage on offer in Turin, though, slamming reports which claimed otherwise.
“At a certain point it was a bit tiring [hearing all the reports],” he told Dutch newspaper AD. “The most insane thing I read was that I wouldn’t go to PSG because I wanted to earn more than Kylian Mbappe. What nonsense.”
