From The Vault: Zambrotta’s 3 in 1 role takes Juventus to the final

Stadio delle Alpi, Turin. It’s been five years since that Predrag Mijatovic goal separated Juventus and Real Madrid in the final of the Champions League. Their first encounter since then was a first leg semi-final in 2003 at the Santiago Bernabeu. A 2–1 lead gave Real Madrid a head start before they traveled to Turin.

The problem though for the Spanish side was the absence of Claude Makelele in midfield and Ronaldo up front due to injuries. On the other hand, Ciro Ferrara couldn’t feature for Marcello Lippi’s Juventus due to suspension.

Vicente Del Bosque started in a 4–2–3–1 shape with Guti behind Raul and Zinedine Zidane drifting from the left towards the inside. As for Lippi it was a 4–3–1–2 or was it ? The static shape could be seen as a 4–3–1–2 but this differed depending on the game situation.

The flexibility of the Italian Juve players played a huge part in their rise to European glory in the late 90s and early 2000s. On the day, Gianluca Zambrotta demonstrated that excellently. He started on the right side of a midfield diamond which was spear-headed by Pavel Nedved. Zambrotta had three roles. In possession Zambrotta acted as a right winger moving Roberto Carlos out of position. The resulting space created was attacked regularly by Nedved.

Early on in the game, Zambrotta found Nedved in that space and the Czech player crossed it towards Alessandro Del Piero.

Del Piero should have scored from that position. However, his shot went over the bar.

Starting in a diamond midfield, the shape was asymmetrical once Juve had the ball as Zambrotta moved out wide on the wing. A long ball into him here moves Roberto Carlos further up the field.

Zambrotta then passes the ball to Alessio Tacchinardi. The most important thing to see here is Nedved’s run. He’s untracked attacking the space behind Roberto Carlos. Tacchinardi should have played it into Nedved’s path but he chose David Trezeguet.

Trezeguet smartly flicked it into Nedved’s path. The domino effect here is that Ivan Helguera is put in an uncomfortable position against one of the world’s best players at the time. Nedved crossed it to the far post where Del Piero headed it down towards Trezeguet for the Frenchman to finish. The goal meant that at that moment Juve were heading to Manchester for an all Italian final.

Zidane’s role drifting inside and Roberto Carlos’ tendency to push up the field on the left side meant that Nedved attacked that space in possession and also on offensive transitions.

Here, Roberto Carlos is sprinting back to catch Nedved but Lillian Thuram’s pass is faster than the Brazilian left back.

In a similar scenario to the first Del Piero chance, Nedved is crossing from the same position and Roberto Carlos is yet again trying to intercept it. Del Piero didn’t manage to receive the ball as Fernando Hierro cleared it out to a corner.

Nedved religiously attacked the space Roberto Carlos vacated. In this snippet, Esteban Cambiasso is trying to catch him. Nedved dinks the ball to Trezeguet whose first touch fails him. He still manages to regain the ball and Juve get a dangerous free-kick on the edge of the box.

Nedved was the main beneficial of Lippi’s offensive strategy on the day. In the engine room of this strategy was always Zamrbotta, moving out wide towards the touch-line to attract Roberto Carlos. All of this presented space for Nedved to attack behind the Real Madrid left back.

Out of possession, Zambrotta had two roles. Firstly, he marked Zidane once the Frenchman moved inside the field to act as a creator next to Guti. Zambrotta’s presence prevent Edgar Davids and Tacchinardi from being over-loaded in the center of the pitch.

Zambrotta’s presence here forces Zidane to pass it wide left to Luis Figo. The Frenchman then makes a run towards the space between Thuram and Igor Tudor.

Zambrotta, aware of his duties, keeps track of Zidane and denies Figo a crucial passing option.

The other role was to drop back in a right-wing back position to defend against Roberto Carlos’ bursts forward.

Zambrotta’s positioning here prevents Roberto Carlos from attacking the left wing. Another thing is that it allows Thuram to keep his position and not go out wide creating spaces in Juve’s defensive line. Had Zambrotta not been there, Thuram would have moved out creating space which Guti could have attacked.

The key to Zambrotta’s role was how to balance keeping tabs of Zidane while also making sure he is in the right position and body shape to go wide and defend against Roberto Carlos in case the ball was moved out wide. His presence here allows Juve to have a 4 vs 3 scenario — Figo and Alessandro Birindelli are out of the screen.

Not only that. He manages to retrieve possession and start a Juve counter-attack.

Another example is in the second half when Zidane tried to find Roberto Carlos’ run with a long ball behind the Juventus defence. Zambrotta as always was there to neutralize it.

Imagine Zambrotta wasn’t here. Roberto Carlos would have received the ball comfortably and found himself in a 1 v 1 situation against Gianluigi Buffon. That didn’t happen though as Carlos miss-controlled it and the ball went out to a goal kick.

It was 2–0 by then and after a Buffon penalty save, Nedved technically secured the tie with Juve’s third of the evening. That goal was assisted by the game’s most outstanding player, Zambrotta.

Nedved’s yellow card after a late tackle on Steve McManaman meant that he’ll miss the final in Manchester. Juve moved on to face their Italian counterpart AC Milan in the final but the occasion marked their third successive Champions League final loss.

Juve lost again in a final. Yet, their performance in the semi-final 2nd leg against Real Madrid was one of many where Lippi had the upper hand.