“I had to get used to it”



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Monday, April 13, 2020 at

Matthijs de Ligt has had a troubled first season with Juventus. The defender, who came from Ajax, alternated well with minor games and ended up on the bench several times throughout the year, but was mainly at the starting line, in part due to serious knee injuries from competitors Giorgio Chiellini and Merih. Demiral. In conversation with teammate and goalkeeper Wojciech Szczesny for the Polish YouTube channel Truck on foot De Ligt reveals that he had to get used to the change in playing style in Italy.

“Of course there are similarities, but an Italian coach is always different from a Dutch one,” De Ligt compares his current Juventus coach Maurizio Sarri to Ajax coach Erik ten Hag. “I think it’s more predictable here, you know how to press, how to build. In Ajax you also knew how to press, but with the ball you can do everything you want, you can just In Ajax you have to defend yourself as a rear player, but you also try to score “

Juventus uses a different style of defense than Ajax, which De Ligt had to get used to. “Now we play with zone coverage, whereas I have always played with man coverage,” said the twenty-year-old central defender. “I always kept close to the attacker so he couldn’t escape. Now I’m further away from the attacker. I had to get used to when I had to be on top and when I had to walk back.”

De Ligt also sees a distinction between Italy and the Netherlands in the form of training. “It is excluded here that as a defender you will work long shots after training, but in the Netherlands that is normal. Defenders attack and attackers help defend, all together.” De Ligt says he learns a lot from his experienced teammates Chiellini and Bonucci at Juventus, as well as Virgil van Dijk on the Dutch national team.

“I talk to them a lot about how they see situations and what they would do defensively in those situations,” the international said 23 times. “You try to take certain things from them and add them to your own game. You watch them, but I think in the end it is important not to change your own style of play. Each player has their own style, so I try to find things that I can improve on. that “.


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