After parting ways with José Mourinho and appointing Daniele De Rossi as his successor, Roma have suddenly transformed into one of the best teams in Serie A. They have won six of their seven league matches so far, losing only to runaway league leaders Inter, and also advanced past Feyenoord to reach the Europa League’s Round of 16.
By Neel Shelat
When Daniele De Rossi was announced as Roma’s new head coach, few would have predicted that he would have registered nearly half of Roma’s league wins this season in just a month and a half. That is exactly what has transpired, though, as the 40-year-old coach has proved his doubters wrong.
In fairness to those who had reservations about this move, they had good reason for it. De Rossi’s only prior experience as a senior head coach was in charge of Serie B side SPAL. He was brought in in October 2022 to pull the club away from a relegation battle but failed to do that and was sacked in February with his record reading 3-6-8. With that, as well as the fact that De Rossi was only given a contract until the end of the season, many felt that he was simply brought in as a crowd-pleaser to keep the Giallorossi faithful happily supporting the team in the aftermath of the departure of a fan-favourite.
Whether or not that was the case is a separate question, but it cannot be denied that De Rossi’s status as a club legend from his playing days helped him win instant support from all relevant parties. Equally, though, it must be acknowledged that he has done a fantastic job as a coach.
In his very first game in charge of the club against Hellas Verona, Roma ditched the back three that Mourinho had lived and died by in favour of a 4-3-2-1 shape.
This new formation helped inject some much-needed creativity in Roma’s play by simply sending out a lot of creative players in the midfield. De Rossi did not do anything too audacious tactically, but he was very quick to devise suitable roles for some of his best players right from the off.
For instance, although Paulo Dybala nominally starts towards the right, he was allowed to adopt a very central attacking midfielder role as Rick Karsdorp pushes up on the flank. On the left, Stephan El Shaarawy tends to stay a lot closer to the touchline, enabling Lorenzo Pellegrini to advance and almost operate alongside Dybala. The other two midfielders – generally Leandro Paredes alongside either Eduardo Bove or Bryan Cristante – often form more of a double pivot to help the team comfortably play out of the back, but the presence of Romelu Lukaku up front also offers Roma the option to go long if need be.
The raw numbers paint a great picture of just how good Roma’s attack has been since De Rossi has taken over. They have scored in every single match under him so far with an average of 2.4 goals per game having netted 22 times in their last nine fixtures. Over the course of the season, no team in Serie A has maintained a better attacking output – not even runaway league leaders Inter.
Of course, that is not to say that Roma should be expected to sustain this level of goalscoring. There are a lot of indications that their output will drop off sooner rather than later. For one, they have faced four of the bottom five in their seven league games under De Rossi so far, so many tougher tests await them. More pertinently, they have significantly overperformed their xG tally of 12.8 in the last nine matches, so they are not creating nearly enough to keep scoring well over two goals a game. Still, there can be no doubting the fact that Roma have looked a very changed team in possession under their new head coach, who has afforded a lot more attacking freedom to his creative players which has helped them make the difference on many an occasion already.
At the other end of the pitch, Roma’s defence has not been too sturdy. A foundation of a Mourinho team is a solid defence, so its unraveling unsurprisingly led to his departure. However, De Rossi seemingly has not invested a lot of time to fix that just yet as Roma have kept just two clean sheets under him having conceded 11 goals with an xGA tally of 8.7.
The Giallorossi do not seem to be comfortable pressing sides high up the pitch, so it remains to be seen whether that is something they develop in the coming weeks and months. For now, they mostly tend to sit in a compact mid-block and aim to frustrate opponents rather than immediately win the ball back. It should be noted that they have improved somewhat in this regard, as De Rossi’s initial blocks had clear holes in them which have now been plugged, while the team is also comfortable switching to a back five on occasion.
All things considered, it is safe to conclude that Roma are heading in the right direction once again. While their initial run of results might be too good to stay true over a longer course of time, the team looks a lot better and far more free-flowing going forward now. There is work to do in all aspects, but the restoration of a positive atmosphere around the club, among the fans in the stadium, and the squad itself is a critical development under a new head coach.
The Europa League tie against Brighton & Hove Albion should prove to be De Rossi’s toughest test yet, so that should give us a good idea of exactly what level Roma are operating at currently.
(Images from IMAGO)
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