They are certainly not comparable to the noble left foot of Leo Messi who is playing for the World Cup, but in the meantime, on Thursday 15 December, Udinese found two “working” left-handed players useful to the cause like those of Destiny Udogie and Jean Victor Makengo.
They had been missing since last October 30, when Udinese drew in Cremona, and even if they won’t play Athletic Bilbao in a friendly match at Friuli on Saturday evening, at 8 pm, there is no doubt that their return in perspective will allow coach Andrea Sottil to reconfigure the Udinese in its most admired version.
An ex like Alessandro Orlando is also convinced of this, who in the past put his left-handed at the disposal of Zebretta, later winning important titles with Juventus and Milan. Today Orlando trains and teaches football at Donatello and Udinese goes to see it in the Curva with friends.
IRREPLACEABLE
«It will be good to find Makengo in the midfield, but that’s not the area where there is a lack of spare parts, but on the flanks and therefore, while waiting to find an irreplaceable player like Becao in defence, Udogie is welcome, because with this boy Udinese will be able rediscover the drive that was lacking in the last three games before the break, when Sottil made up for it with Pereyra, without finding good results».
An incipit, that of Orlando, which is the premise for a careful analysis not only of Udogie’s qualities, but also of the modern interpretation of the role of winger which lays the foundations for the development of the offensive manoeuvre.
WORLD EXAMPLES
“I wasn’t convinced that Udogie would maintain a high performance after signing for Tottenham and instead he simply made the difference.
It’s true that playing five-a-side sometimes he wasn’t perfect in defensive diagonals, where you don’t always get to close in time in that formation, but he was also a security for the attack, given that without Udogie Udinese lost during thrust and support phases.
Even at the World Cup we see how much the winger plays according to the attacker in front of him. This was shown by Danilo getting up in the midfield to let Neymar play wide, Theo Hernandez in France, where Griezmann widens, and when we saw Udogie take center stage at Udinese it was Deulofeu who went wide into the space created by the Azzurrino.
It always depends on how you want to play, but there is no longer a straight track on the wings and the wingers have to look for spaces inside the pitch to give them to their teammates».
SMALL LETTER
Then, as an enthusiast and colleague, here is the little Christmas gift addressed to my colleague Sottil. “Reinforcements? For me, Udinese are more balanced than ever in all departments, but the only aspect is that with these players I can’t see an alternative to the recurring form, assuming you want to try it.
I struggle to think of a 4-3-3, for example, and I don’t see a real attacking midfielder capable of making the team play even with their backs to goal».
Then the “request” moves to a couple of players: «I’d like to see Beto improve in his predisposition to team play, where Success has much more, making the team go up, and I’d like Samardzic to find continuity also in playing time . Now he is at 60% ».