Four Things We Learned: Winning start for Ranieri

Ideal start for Ranieri

After the events of the previous week, which culminated in Claudio Ranieri taking over the managerial reins for his second spell in charge of Roma, it was vital the Giallorossi returned to winning ways.

And, courtesy of strikes from Stephan El Shaarawy and Patrik Schick, they did precisely that by beating Empoli 2-1, as Ranieri kicked off with his tenure with a valuable three points.

Wanting his team to be compact and harder to score against, plus to show some their character, Roma crucially looked far more stable when defending, only giving up one shot on target, as Empoli were frustrated on their way to registering a paltry XG of 0.19.

Despite conceding an unfortunate own goal, Ranieri cut a content figure with his undermanned team's efforts on both ends, while making a point of showing gratitude towards the fans.

"Putting a team together when we didn’t have many players and were without the bigger players – the leaders that give a sense of direction to the side – wasn’t easy. I knew it was going to be tough," he noted.

"I have to congratulate the team, because they stayed compact even with ten men and never gave the opposition a chance to score. The first match is done now. I want to say a big thank you to the fans because they stayed close to us during a tough time and that’s important.”

Kluivert's edge

Handed just his ninth league start of the campaign, Justin Kluivert's fantastic performance emphatically repaid the faith placed in him by Ranieri. Operating with flair, confidence and enthusiasm, the winger's superb dribbling ability and scintillating pace gave Roma some tremendous attacking impetus, both on the counter and in more methodical build-up.

Due to Roma funneling 45% of their attacks down his side, he relished being a key avenue for the home side, as he ran his experienced 36-year-old opponent, Manuel Pasqual, ragged. Indeed, Ranieri's plan to identify this match-up as one that would give his side an upper hand certainly worked wonders, as Kluivert was especially effective when running in behind and in 1v1 battles, where he used his trickery and rapid changes of pace and direction to unbalance his adversary.

The fact he won the free kick with a super Cruyff turn that consequently saw Schick head home the winner served as a testament to his work.

His statistics accentuated his encouraging efforts, as the 19-year-old completed eight successful dribbles, six progressive runs, two shots, two touches inside the box and one key pass.

Interesting offensive dynamics

Beginning the match with what was ostensibly a 4-4-2 formation, which morphed into more of a 4-2-3-1 after the opening two goals were scored when Nicolo Zaniolo began to drop deeper, Ranieri's offensive mechanics offered some interesting talking points.

Aside from clearly opting to focus their attacks down the right to exploit Kluivert's quality, as previously mentioned, Roma's frontline also gave Empoli plenty of headaches with their smart, well-coordinated movement.

Up against Giuseppe Iachini's back three, the way El Shaarawy would venture upfield to act as an auxiliary central attacker alongside Schick and Zaniolo enabled the trio to make some great connections due to their close proximity to one another.

In addition, their positioning also gave Roma a fantastic threat in behind, with all three using their expertise at embarking on depth runs from central locations to stretch and unsettle their opposition.

Showing fantastic intent to attack the box, link play in and around the box or create space for a teammate, the way Ranieri used El Shaarawy's striking attributes when the ball was on the right was a real highlight.

The images below aptly demonstrate how damaging some of their movement was.

Defensive pressing scheme offers positivity

Renowned for his capacity to organise his teams sternly on the defensive end, there were some promising signs that the Italian tactician will be able to rectify some of Roma's defensive issues.

One particular aspect that warrants mention came from his pressing setup whenever the Blues attempted to pass out from the back.

With Empoli enjoying a 3v2 numerical superiority in the first line of engagement, one of Zaniolo or Schick would press the closest central defender while using their cover shadow to block passing routes as the other shifted across to mark the holding midfielder.

To supplement this, one of Roma's central midfielders would mark the ball near Empoli eight and the other would shift across to condense space and be ready to support or pick up a marking assignment. The Giallorossi's wingers would then track the wing backs, which left Roma's backline to manage Empoli's front two of Francesco Caputo and Diego Farias.

Performing their duties effectively for the most part and doing a proficient job of disrupting their adversaries, Roma will be hoping to build on this moving forward in their quest to become a formidable defensive outfit once again.

All statistics provided by InStat.