Thiago Motta: ‘Atalanta will not allow Juventus time on the ball’ | OneFootball

Thiago Motta warns Juventus must be both ‘fired up and calm’ against Atalanta this evening, confident that La Dea will ‘not allow us much time on the ball’ due to the high press.

It kicks off at the Allianz Juventus Stadium in Turin at 19.45 GMT.

You can follow all the build-up and action as it happens from today’s Serie A matches on the Liveblog.

This is a potentially huge result not just for European ambitions, but even potentially the Scudetto race, because last week’s slowdown at the top allowed Juve to close on the leading pack.

“There is a responsibility of playing for Juventus and we must use it the right way,” Thiago Motta told DAZN.

“I always said my lads are responsible, so if we do not express our full potential on the field, that gives an advantage to our opponents. It is something we need to work on, that mentality to be fired up, but also calm enough to understand the moments of the match and make the right decisions.”

Thiago Motta urges Juventus calm

TURIN, ITALY – MARCH 03: Khephren Thuram of Juventus runs with the ball whilst under pressure from Antoine Bernede of Hellas Verona during the Serie A match between Juventus and Verona at Allianz Stadium on March 03, 2025 in Turin, Italy. (Photo by Valerio Pennicino/Getty Images)

The absentee list remains lengthy, including Francisco Conceicao, Douglas Luiz, Nicolò Savona, Jonas Rouhi, Arek Milik, Gleison Bremer and Juan Cabal.

Kenan Yildiz is suffering from a stomach bug, but starts anyway, while Renato Veiga and Pierre Kalulu are only fit for the bench.

“I congratulated my players after the victory over Verona, because they kept playing the same way. It can happen that towards the end you start to get a bit frenetic and leave yourself open to the counter-attacks, which we cannot do,” added Thiago Motta.

“I don’t think Atalanta will allow us much time on the ball, other than passing it back to the goalkeeper, but we don’t want to do that too much.

“We want to go forward, maintaining the right balance against players like Lookman, Cuadrado and Retegui who can be dangerous on the counter.

“We need the balance of attacking well, but also anticipating the dangers of those transitions and be ready to defend.”