Juventus manager Thiago Motta voiced his frustration following his side’s draw with Atalanta on Tuesday, acknowledging that while they remain unbeaten, their growing tally of draws means the Turin side are falling short of the club’s expectations.
Fifth-placed Juve were held to another stalemate on Tuesday, this time at Atalanta where a goal from Pierre Kalulu was cancelled out by Mateo Retegui who levelled the score at 1-1.
Motta acknowledged that despite Juve being unbeaten this season, the number of draws means results are not good enough for the club, with his side now having racked up 13 draws and only 34 points — 15 fewer than at the same stage last season.
“It’s clear that we can’t be happy with the result; we go on the pitch to win. We played well, created some interesting situations, but we weren’t good enough to score,” Motta told reporters.
“It’s true that we have drawn a lot this season and are not happy about that, we cannot be happy with a draw.
“However, they [the players] performed well. I have to acknowledge the effort and the performance.
“Now we have an important match against a great team, we need to recover well,” he added, referring to the visit of seventh-placed AC Milan on Saturday.
Motta did not confirm whether forward Dusan Vlahovic would be ready for the clash or if Italian media reports that France striker Randal Kolo Muani has agreed to join Juve on a six-month loan deal from Paris St Germain were true.
“I do not talk about the transfer market. Dusan is recovering, he is not at 100% and we cannot risk losing him for longer, so we’ll see what happens over the next three days,” Motta said.
Juve scorer Kalulu acknowledged that the run of draws was starting to take the focus away from their performances.
“A good evening at the beginning, then this goal conceded overshadows everything a bit. We always have to do something more to get points,” the defender said.
