Juventus beat Lecce 2-0 at the Via Del Mare on Sunday, with Weston McKennie and Douglas Luiz scoring the goals. Luiz's strike was his debut competitive goal.
Goals and result
McKennie and Luiz scored as Juventus secured a 2-0 win over Lecce. The match was played at the Via Del Mare.
Tactical change in midfield
Football Italia quoted Spalletti as saying: "We spoke about what we needed most. We changed something on a tactical level by playing with three midfielders, because in these sorts of moments you need more solidity and clarity and we did the most logical thing."
Spalletti added: "But then you have to put the players into positions where they do well, and it means excluding wide players who have previously done well for us."
Spalletti opted for a three-man midfield to support a strike duo of Randal Kolo Muani and Nick Woltemade.
Second-half concerns
Spalletti revealed: "The players played a very good game in terms of pace and playing openly. We dropped off a bit in terms of our management in the second half and then everything became more difficult because we had less courage. We needed to do the same things as we did in the first half. We found this system, which brings solidity, and we’re happy with that because we immediately saw a better team performance. The second half, however, we seemed to go backwards."
Spalletti concluded: "They came out in a 4-3-3 and in the second half they played three at the back and went man for man. We stayed put, we didn’t press with any force and we no longer built from the back. The goalkeeper had a lot more passes to make in the second half. We had a two-goal lead, but that wasn’t enough to lose our measure. We didn’t concede, but we weren’t very proactive in trying to close the game."
Praise for Douglas Luiz
The manager noted: "He had a great game today, he fought and ran, he battled on all sides and he helped clean up certain situations when we needed him to."