Juventus boss Thiago Motta admitted that Juventus' growing number of draws is causing the club to fall short of expectations in all competitions this season.
Motta watched on as his side were held to a 1-1 draw by Scudetto chasers Atalanta at the Gewiss Stadium, while Pierre Kalulu's opener was canceled out by Mateo Retegui.
The result leaves Juventus fifth in the standings, 13 points behind leaders Napoli, with a tempting draw against AC Milan next for the Bianconeri.
Juventus became the second team to draw at least thirteen of the first twenty matches in a Serie A season in the three points for a winning era, after Inter in the 2004–05 season (14).
They have 34 points after 20 Serie A games this season, compared to 49 last season. That 15-point difference is the worst seen in either campaign.
Although Motta is the second manager in Juventus history to remain unbeaten in his first 20 games in Serie A, he had to deal with another league deadlock.
“It is clear that we cannot be happy with the result. We are going on the field to win,” Motta told reporters. “We played well, created some interesting situations, but were not good enough to score.
“It is true that we have had a lot of draws this season and we are not happy with that, we cannot be happy with a draw. But they (the players) have performed well. I have to recognize the effort and the performance.
“Now that we have an important match against a great team, we have to recover well,” he added, referring to Saturday's visit of seventh-place Milan.
Motta was also unable to confirm whether Dusan Vlahovic would be ready for this weekend's match with Sergio Conceicao's side.
Vlahovic, who has scored 12 goals in 23 games in all competitions this season, missed the draw against Atalanta due to muscle fatigue.
The Juventus boss also brushed aside rumors in the Italian media that dropped Paris Saint-Germain striker Randal Kolo Muani had signed a six-month loan deal.
“I'm not talking about the transfer market. Dusan is recovering, he's not 100% yet and we can't risk losing him any longer, so we'll see what happens in the next three days,” Motta said.
Kalulu, who became the third French defender to score for Juventus in Serie A after Lilian Thuram (one) and Patrice Evra (three), also acknowledged his side needed to improve.
“It was a good evening at the beginning, but then this goal overshadowed everything a bit. We always have to do a little more to get points,” said the defender.
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