Juventus' Strength in Depth Makes Them Serie A Title Favourites

As football across Europe inches closer to a return and the dust is blown off the tossed aside league tables, Serie A boasts something of a bottleneck at the business end.

Juventus, in the hunt for their ninth consecutive Scudetto, occupy the familiar position of first place but are just one point above the surprise challengers Lazio.

The core of Simone Inzaghi's team have been playing together for the best part of four years and prior to the enforced hiatus, they were the form side on the continent. The Eagles go into the restart unbeaten in 21 league games, the longest current run in Europe's top five divisions.

However, as the Bundesliga's return has demonstrated, football in a post-pandemic setting isn't a seamless continuation of what has gone before. While the death of 'home advantage' is all too readily seized upon and every muscle injury is intensely scrutinised, a tangible difference in the footballing sphere, following the hiatus, is the additional substitutions available.

With teams now able to deploy five players from the bench and in the absence of crowd, the focus has turned from the metaphorical 12th man, towards the 15th and 16th members of the squad.

Juventus and Lazio are no strangers to turning to the bench for inspiration - only two other Serie A sides have made three subs in every available fixture so far - but when the scope of replacements is widened, its Maurizio Sarri's side who appear to pull away in terms of talent.

In the early days of his reign in Turin, Sarri had the gall to actually lament this myriad of options. In August the former Chelsea boss claimed: "We have to cut six players. Our situation is difficult, almost embarrassing, because we run the risk of leaving out players of a really high level."

Emre Can bore the brunt of this competition for places as he was first omitted from the 23-man Champions League squad before being loaned out and ultimately sold to Borussia Dortmund at the turn of the year.

However, with this rule change, Sarri will be able to utilise a wider range of the plethora of talent getting splinters on the Juventus bench.

In theory, the two players who could stand to immediately benefit from these extra substitutions are Danilo and Sami Khedira - Juve's 15th and 16th most used players in Serie A by minutes played.

Danilo, the former Real Madrid and Manchester City defender, is an ideal option from the bench as he offers versatility and consistency from either full-back slot. And in Khedira, Sarri can turn to a World Cup-winning midfielder who he has the utmost confidence in. Sarri recently described the German as 'a footballer of extraordinary reliability and intelligence' and claimed 'a coach cannot do without him' to the official Juventus website.

While the strength of Lazio's starting XI is nothing to be sniffed at - they boast the division's top scorer (Ciro Immobile), top assist provider (Luis Alberto) and one of Serie A's best midfielders in the form of Sergej Milinkovic-Savic - they do appear to fall short when looking to their replacements.

Lazio's additional subs could be the less revered names of Adam Marusic and Spanish wingback Jony. Each certainly fit into Inzaghi's specific 3-5-2 formation but neither pose quite the option of Juve's duo.

As we delve deeper into the sides' reserves, the comparisons become less and less favourable with the chasm exasperated by the contrasting impact offered by Douglas Costa and Lazio's Danilo Cataldi.

Both rank 18th for their respective teams in terms of league minutes played but Juve's Brazilian winger can point to a mass of trophies on his mantle piece along with pace and directness which terrifies opposition backlines. Cataldi has made one Serie A start all season and was last regularly seen in the midfield of relegated Benevento.

Juve can also turn to the likes of the fine utility player Mattia De Sciglio while Giorgio Chiellini is their only outfielder with less than 200 minutes to his name. An anomaly caused by a severe knee and injury which is sure to be will swiftly rectified upon football's resumption.

The reigning champions have a squad so overflowing with talent that Rodrigo Bentancur, one of the most elegant and impressive young midfielders in Europe, struggles to regularly nail down a starting berth. His chances of elbowing his way into the first XI weren't helped by Sarri lording the improvement of fellow midfielder Miralem Pjanic during the break.

Lazio's conviction, grit and their love of a late goal mean they won't simply roll over for Juventus to treat this final part of the season as a title procession. But, with the searing heat of Italy - and in particular Rome - in the summer, this final sprint to the finish will sap the energy of even the fittest athletes.

Inzaghi's inability to match the squad depth of a super-club on a fraction of the budget may ultimately deny his title ambitions. But he, and his team, can take great satisfaction from how close they've pushed the perennial champions, with nothing set in stone quite yet.