Juventus' New Approach: Spalletti's Open Door Policy

At Juventus, a summer of trimming the fat was supposed to be straightforward. It rarely is.

The club still carries a heavy load of players who no longer fit the project, expensive signings who never quite became the difference-makers they were bought to be. They arrived at the Allianz Stadium with fanfare and expectation; they now sit on lists marked “transferable,” waiting for calls that often never come.

Other clubs are wary. Wages are high, recent performances underwhelming, and reputations have faded. Juventus know some of these names may still be on their books when the window closes.

That is where Luciano Spalletti has chosen to rip up the script.

From Motta’s clear-out to Spalletti’s open door

Under Thiago Motta, the approach was blunt and quick. As soon as he walked through the door, he drew a line through the squad, separating those he trusted from those he did not intend to use. The message to the board was equally clear: find solutions, find exits, move them on.

Players outside his plans trained apart, waited for agents to work the phones, and watched their Juventus chapter fade before a ball was kicked.

Spalletti has gone the other way.

Rather than banishing the unwanted, he has folded everyone back into the group. Every player, regardless of status or past disappointment, has been included in his pre-season plans. Even someone like Arthur Melo, long treated as a symbol of misjudged investment, has been handed minutes and a platform to show something new.

The tone around Continassa has changed. Instead of a closed door, there is an audition.

A manager who wants to see for himself

Spalletti’s stance has been summed up by Giovanni Albanese, speaking to Tuttojuve. He argued against the habit of discarding players too early “like stickers,” and underlined that the coach wants to study the entire squad before passing judgment. Only if the response on the pitch is negative, Albanese explained, will Spalletti ask the club to move those players out. As long as he brings them, watches them, and evaluates them, there is value in the process.

It is a subtle but important shift. Decisions will not be made on reputation, on past seasons, or on old labels pinned to a player’s back. They will be made on what Spalletti sees now, in training sessions and pre-season games, under his own demands and his own ideas.

For the club, the strategy carries a certain logic. A player written off last year might show enough to attract a buyer or, in some cases, fight his way back into contention. For the dressing room, it sends a different kind of message: nobody is discarded before they’ve had the chance to convince the new man.

Juventus still hope to offload several of these names before the market shuts. That part has not changed. But this time, the final word will not come from a list drawn up in June. It will come from Spalletti’s notebook, filled in day by day, as he decides who belongs in the next Juventus and who will be told their time in Turin is over.