‘Has anybody seen Juve?’: The knives are ALREADY out for Pirlo after uninspiring defeat to Barcelona – how much time will he get?

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Despite those absences, the team have at times shown more flashes of excitement than they did last season under Sarri, even if their results thus far haven’t been up to scratch.

Even on Wednesday, it wasn’t all doom and gloom for Juventus. Morata had three goals ruled out for offside, and while they were all correct decisions, on another night they could easily have got something from the game.

Pirlo is acutely aware he needs to start producing positive results.

“It’s a year in which we’re building, but we want to try and reach results,” he said after the match. “I’m not here to build without winning. 

“Maybe we will need a bit more time, but we have to know that results must come through a certain type of play style that maybe we are struggling to assimilate.

“We have to improve a lot in terms of attitude, in being good at playing this kind of game.”

It’s clear there’s a lot of room for improvement, but when matchwinners like Ronaldo, De Ligt and Chiellini are able to return that will provide a significant boost to their chances of collecting three points in each game.

Time is a luxury afforded to few managers at the top level when things aren’t going as planned, but Juve knew they were throwing a rookie coach in at the deep end when they hired Pirlo in the summer – if they don’t give him chance to turn things around they should never have bothered appointing him in the first place.