One night of Marcelo Bielsa was enough to send Juventus loco — Square Ball 21/11/23
FRIENDLY BULLFIGHT
Written by: Rob Conlon
It was Juventus’ night. They were playing a pre-season
friendly against Espanyol at a stadium in San Benedetto, on the East Coast of
Italy, almost 400 miles away from Turin. Even if their hardcore fans in the
north didn’t fancy a trip to the seaside, there were enough local glory hunters
to fill the ground. The teams walked out for kick-off through a thick cloud of
smoke from all the pyro being lit from the stands that covered the length of
the field.
It didn’t matter who Juventus were playing, the crowd was
there to celebrate the best team in Europe. Juve had won the last two Serie A
titles, reached the last three Champions League finals, and had also claimed
the European Super Cup and Club World Cup. Zinedine Zidane was making his first
appearance since becoming the hero of France’s 1998 World Cup win, playing in
midfield alongside the man who lifted the trophy, Didier Deschamps. The legions
of photographers covering the touchline didn’t notice Espanyol never bothered
to pose for a team picture, they were too busy snapping photos of the Juventus
players.
Marcello Lippo was so relaxed in the Juventus dugout he lit
a cigar. His opposite number didn’t even want to be there. Marcelo Bielsa had
only been employed by Espanyol for just over a month, but four days before the
friendly he had been appointed manager of Argentina. When Bielsa took the
Espanyol job, his first in Europe, he insisted on a clause in his contract
allowing him to leave if he was offered the big gig with the national team.
Like Angus Kinnear refusing to answer a call from Bournemouth, Espanyol
disputed the clause they agreed to. Eventually they reached a compromise:
Bielsa would stay until Christmas, unless they found a replacement sooner.
Bielsa didn’t even last until November. He was replaced
after Espanyol won just one of their opening six La Liga fixtures. Nobody was
that bothered. He was jeered in what turned out to be his last game in charge,
a 2-1 defeat at Real Valladolid, after slipping and falling over by the
touchline. His relationship with the club’s board had become so strained that
Espanyol’s president Daniel Sánchez Llibre left his sporting director Fernando
Molinos to tell Bielsa they’d found someone else.
It was still worth the stress, if only for that night by the
Adriatic Sea against Juventus.
Until that point, Espanyol’s pre-season had been as
underwhelming as many Bielsa pre-seasons. He left their Intertoto Cup fixtures
to the reserve side, coached by Paco Flores, aiding the emergence of Spain’s
future World Cup-winning left-back Joan Capdevila. Meanwhile, the first team
failed to win any of their first five friendlies under their new manager. They
began their summer by scoring an own-goal two minutes into a 2-0 defeat at
Everton, and drew 1-1 with a Coventry side coached by Gordon Stachan and led in
attack by Noel Whelan.
No wonder Juventus seemed relaxed, then. But it didn’t take
long before their fans were whistling at Espanyol’s temerity to attack, attack,
attack. Juan Esnáider, Espanyol’s brooding bastard of a number 9, relished the
role of pantomime villain, gladly picking a fight with the typically irritable
Edgar Davids before trying to lob Juve’s ‘keeper from forty yards.
It wasn’t so much Espanyol’s attacking that seemed to bother
the Juventus players. It was the tackling. They just wouldn’t bloody leave them
alone. The cheek of it! Zidane was particularly fed up, sulking around the
pitch and constantly hassled off the ball, resembling a balding dad who’d been
invited to make up the numbers in a five-a-side arranged by much younger work
colleagues.
“We were not ready to compete against such a tough, fierce
rival,” Lippi said afterwards, once he’d finished his latest cigar. It really
showed. While Juventus fans were bouncing up and down in the stands, Alessandro
Del Piero was yelling at Espanyol defender Ivan Helguera for an innocuous foul.
Deschamps was next to throw a tantrum, consoled by an opposition player patting
him on the head. Throughout it all, Davids seemed intent on starting a fight
with anyone who came near him. A friendly? La Gazzetta dello Sport described
the game as “a bullfight”. David Batty would have loved it.
Ten minutes before half-time, Del Piero had enough. Davids
had already sparked another melee that finally got Lippi out of his seat —
Bielsa remained crouching — even though Juventus were awarded a free-kick. As
Espanyol were clearing the set-piece, Del Piero claimed he had been elbowed in
the face. It was soft, but enough for Italy’s Footballer of the Year to respond
by booting his opponent in the shins, right in front of the referee. After
being given a straight red card, Del Piero was guided down the tunnel by riot
police. Juventus fans were throwing flares onto the pitch whenever Espanyol won
a corner, but by this point the authorities were more concerned by the violence
among the players.
Neither team heeded the warning of the red card. Juve
defender Paolo Montero got away with his own elbow to the face of an Espanyol
player from a set-piece, before the visitors’ number 10 Peque Benítez couldn’t
resist the temptation of kicking Davids and was sent off for a second yellow
card shortly before half-time.
Bielsa remained calm during the first half, barely reacting
to his team being reduced to ten players apart from having a short word with
one of his backroom staff and telling his side to get on with it. But during
the break it was as if he decided that, if this was how Juventus were going to
play it, then fine — he’d play by their rules.
The second half began with Deschamps elbowing someone else
in the face and was played to a backing track of Bielsa growling at his players
from the touchline. Espanyol’s winger was given a big round of applause from
his boss for closing down his full-back and blocking a clearance. After Davids
won another soft free-kick, Bielsa exploded in frustration and was told off by
the ref, apologising with a gentle smile and thumbs up. He was less effective
trying to disguise his fury at striker Esnáider missing an open goal at the
back post, turning away to hide his disgust from his players.
Juventus started to appear regretful of their provocation.
With twenty minutes left, Lippi had made six subs, protecting his star players
but introducing Antonio Conte to maintain the bastardry. Bielsa wasn’t going to
let his players relent. He left his starting XI on the pitch, still sprinting,
still attacking, still tackling.
Espanyol were adapting to Bielsa’s demands, but he had a
couple of his disciples on the pitch. He was reunited at Espanyol with Mauricio
Pochettino, thirteen years on from the night he examined the legs of a sleeping
Pochettino and, like a clairvoyant reading some tea leaves, foretold the
thirteen-year-old’s future as an international footballer. Bielsa joined
Espanyol after winning the Argentine Clausura title with Vélez Sarsfield, and
brought with him winger Martín Posse. Posse also ventured into management after
finishing his playing career and is now tasked with trying to stop Pablo
Hernandez in the Kings League, and arrived at Espanyol fully aware of the
extremes of Bielsa’s intensity. Bielsa was a guest at Posse’s wedding just a
few hours after Vélez had played against Boca Juniors, and rocked up with a
video of the match so Posse could study his performance.
As Juventus were wilting, Bielsa’s screams were getting
louder. Posse cut in from the left wing and slammed the ball inside in the near
post. “¡GOL, GOL, GOL, GOL, GOL!” yelled the commentator, but Bielsa was too
busy shouting at his players to start celebrating. Lippi went back to his
dugout and continued chain smoking.
With a lead to defend, it was Espanyol’s turn to embrace the
dark arts. One Juventus player was shoved over by the corner of the pitch;
another fell over in midfield to groans from the stand, sprinted into a tackle
to atone for his error, bounced off the Espanyol midfielder and ended up on the
floor once again. With around ten minutes to go, a stat flashed up on the
broadcast showing a combined 45 fouls had been committed by either side, just
as Bielsa was barking “¡CARAJO!” over the bangs of fireworks being let off
around the ground.
