With the summer transfer season now well underway, there has been plenty of activity taking place as clubs compete to attract new names and bolster their ranks ahead of the upcoming campaign.
In the women’s game, one side who have been especially busy is Juventus Femminile, who will be seeking to ensure that they have a strong chance of lifting silverware in 2024/25 and of making new head coach Massimiliano Canzi’s first season at the helm a fruitful one.
What has really stood out about their business is that they have been dipping into a rich variety of markets, with versatile Italy wide player Valentina Bergamaschi signing from AC Milan Femminile but Switzerland forward Alisha Lehmann, Denmark attacker Amalie Vangsgaard and Sweden midfielder Hanna Bennison among those moving from abroad, having left Aston Villa Women, PSG Feminines and Everton Women respectively to link up with Canzi’s Serie A Femminile outfit.
If rumours are to be believed, the Italian side is not finished yet and does still have some names remaining on their summer shopping list.
Another who is rumoured to have sparked their interest is Slovakian midfielder Mária Mikolajová.
Currently plying her trade for St. Pölten Frauen in the Austrian Frauen Bundesliga, she is someone that many feel has the potential to be a future star, and adding her to their ranks would certainly represent another signal of intent from the Italian team.
With that in mind, this Maria Mikolajova tactical analysis will take a closer look at what they could gain by bringing her to Turin this summer and why doing so would be another really positive step forward as they continue to assemble a squad capable of challenging for honours.
Maria Mikolajova’s Attacking threat
Whilst Mária Mikolajová is a midfielder by trade, it is not uncommon to see her drifting into more advanced spaces and operating as an additional attacking threat whenever her team have possession.
The fact that both her club and her national side have given her licence to operate higher up the field has led to it being incorporated into their overall game plans as time has gone by, and it could be expected that she would bring the same offensive presence to Juventus if they were to move for her this summer.
What has allowed the St.
Pölten player to thrive when in forward areas is her exceptional spatial awareness and understanding of how she can have an impact on the play, and her ability to operate in almost a hybrid midfield/forward role proved to be especially vital against Lyon Féminin during last season’s Champions League group stage.
St.
Pölten’s tactics on the day were to get on the front foot and take the game to their opponents whenever there was an opportunity (which is not something that they always do), and this was one situation when it almost paid off, allowing them to put the ball beyond former Chile goalkeeper Christiane Endler.
What really stood out was the way that every player involved worked in a coordinated and unified manner.
Mikolajová was essential to that being the case as she initially held her position whilst the Lyon goalkeeper was pressed.
The ball fell to teammate Mateja Sver before running forward to exploit the gap left open by France captain Wendie Renard, giving the Slovenia international a passing option and a chance to relieve the pressure she had come under.
The chance might not have led to anything on this occasion, with Lyon able to react in time and block Mikolajová’s effort.
Still, there is no doubt that they were tested here and that the Slovakia international played a crucial role in ensuring they had to work hard to keep the Austrian champions at bay.
It is not only in central spaces where Mikolajová has had an effect with the ball at her feet, though, with her also seen drifting into wider areas at times as she looks to stretch the play and to allow her team to operate in the expansive manner that they prefer to.
When in these positions, her attention is once again firmly on assessing her surroundings and working hard for the good of her team, and that comes through her desire to create gaps in the middle and to then send the ball into areas from which those inside her can get a shot away at goal.
What allows her to pose a threat in these areas is her clever manipulation of the ball and her ability to remove individual opponents from the game.
Here, she receives the ball and instantly dries it back inside the pitch, which opens up an angle from which she can then direct the ball back into the central channel and prevents Brann Kvinner’s Sara Ritter from closing her down and winning it before she has had a chance to do so.
However, whilst this aspect of her play is positive and generally has the desired effect, it tends to fall down when the actual cross is made, which is not one of Mikolajová’s strengths.
In this case, she had time to give either forward Valentina Mädl or Croatia defender Leonarda Balog a chance to run in behind the Brann back line but ended up sending the ball too far in front of them and giving Norway goalkeeper Aurora Mikalsen an easy gather.
With just one of her five attempted deliveries in the Champions League finding their intended target, it is clear that this is one area of her game that does need improving as she continues to develop.
It is something that Juventus or any other interested party will need to bear in mind when they inquire about her availability.
Whilst this section of the scout report has largely revolved around how Mikolajová can support teammates in advanced positions, she is just as capable of taking matters into her own hands, too, and this has been one of the defining characteristics of her play.
The telltale sign that she is shaping up to try her luck is when she starts to position herself on the edge of the goal area, just as she has here against Israel, and it is from this position that most of her efforts have come from.
In this case, she was slightly fortunate that the ball came to her, with Diana Bartovičová’s shot being blocked and Shahar Nakav making a poor attempt to clear the ball, but the fact that she showed no signs of hesitation when the chance did present itself highlights how she always backs herself when in these areas to find the back of the net.
On this occasion, her effort missed the target because Israel reacted to the danger, and Elianna Beard moved to close her down, but the threat was once again there, and it highlights how there are different layers to Mikolajová’s attacking play that make her a constant risk to opposing back lines.
Maria Mikolajova’s Role in Transitions and Ball Movement
Nevertheless, while it is clear that Mária Mikolajová is highly effective in forward areas, it was mentioned earlier in the analysis that she is a midfielder first and foremost.
So it does seem likely that, whilst Juventus could use her in different areas as they experimented with her role in the team, this is where she would be most commonly seen.
However, this doesn’t limit her abilities in any way and instead allows her to demonstrate other aspects of her play, with her looking to use her strong passing ability to allow both St.
Pölten and Slovakia to play in the transitional manner that both favour.
The key thing to note, though, is that neither is a one-dimensional side.
Instead, they like to leave their options open and ensure that they can keep their opponents guessing, and that is where Mikolajová becomes really critical.
In this case, she has received the ball and has been closed down from behind by Latvia midfielder Viktorija Zaičikova, but what the latter player doesn’t know is where Mikolajová will go and in which direction she will try to send the ball.
This unpredictability comes through the Slovakian’s ability to move off in either direction with equal ease and to make sharp changes of direction on the spot to create gaps in her vicinity.
That once again came into play here as she hinted at going one way before then moving off in the other direction and taking the ball beyond her opponent.
At that stage, it comes down to her ability to find teammates around the field, and that, too, is not an issue for her, with her registering a 75.8% passing accuracy in the Nations League and seeing 71.6% of her passes find their intended target in the Euro 2025 qualifying matches.
Therefore, this is why both her club team and her national side rely so heavily on her when they are constructing sequences of play, and it was vital that she was able to offer these qualities during the two-legged Nations League tie against Latvia as they are a team with weapons and who will capitalise on indecision and inaccuracy.
That is not to say that Mikolajová is only useful when her team is looking to move the ball around the field, though.
She is just as capable of holding onto it and slowing the tempo down when necessary.
This mainly happens when she is the most advanced player on the pitch for her side and doesn’t have any options ahead of her to look for, as is the case here against Lyon as St.
Pölten have tried to launch a counterattack.
In these moments, it is her individual strength that really comes to the fore, with her fighting hard to stay between the ball and those looking to win it off her.
On this occasion, she manages to keep former Germany midfielder Dzsenifer Marozsán from regaining the ball and allows her teammates time to get up the field and to offer the necessary supporting options, and it is at that point that she then releases the ball, as she does to Zver here, and allows them to once again settle into their transitional mindset.
Therefore, she is capable of affecting the game in central areas both when her team is playing at a fast and a more measured tempo.
Her ability to adapt between the two is another reason that she has been linked with a big move this summer.
However, there are other ways in which she can affect the game, such as when her team is out of possession and is looking to stifle the opposing side’s attempts to build their own attacks.
Here, Brann are in the process of building an attack and are looking to transfer the ball into space, with the horizontal pass that now-Wolfsburg Frauen midfielder Justine Kielland makes towards Ritter designed to do just that.
Initially, it appears to be quite a conservative and risk-free pass, but what Brann haven’t recognised here is that Mikolajová is waiting and watching, positioned slightly ahead of midfield teammates Anna Johanning and Claudia Wenger and is looking for an opportunity to cancel the attack in its infancy.
This aerial ball presents the perfect chance for her to do just that, with her intercepting it and reacting at the right moment to regain possession for her side.
Given that this is one of four interceptions that she made during the Champions League group stage and that she averaged 3.7 and 4.03 per game in the Nations League and Euro 2025 qualifying matches, respectively, it is clear that her ability to be disruptive and to break up play is another positive aspect of her game.
Many prospective future employers will certainly be interested in this.
Defensive qualities of Maria Mikolajova
That is not the only thing that Mária Mikolajová offers defensively, though, and she is instead just as effective in deeper areas as she is when nearer the top of the field, and it has been just as common to see her dropping back to aid her team’s defensive presence as it has been to see her supporting the attack.
This again highlights how she is a team player and is always happy to fill in where needed, giving her side the best possible chance of succeeding on the field.
It was mentioned earlier in the scout report that St.
Pölten have different ways of defending and can move between them depending on what is happening in front of them, with the Austrian team capable of playing in a proactive manner as they did against Lyon but also having the ability to sit back and to be more passive if they are under sustained pressure.
However, regardless of which of the two styles they do opt for, what is always apparent is their inherent desire to win the ball, and that means that they always look to close opponents down in one way or another and to ensure that the other team doesn’t have things entirely their own way.
That is where Mikolajová has been able to utilise her attacking instincts inside her own third, with her here tracking Ritter and looking to prevent her from creating anything that would give Brann a chance to shoot at goal.
What is critical to note, though, is that the St.
Pölten player doesn’t simply dive in and is instead more subtle about how she manages the threat from the German defender.
She initially watches and waits and then reacts as soon as Ritter makes her move.
In this case, that saw her force the ball out of play and prevent Ritter from finding a teammate, with them losing the momentum that they had built up until this point as a result.
It is not difficult to see why Mikolajová succeeded in 61.7% of her defensive duels in the Champions League and has won 69.2% and 62.2% of them in the Nations League and the Euro 2025 qualifying matches, respectively.
This is, therefore, another tactical feature that she will bring to Juventus if they follow up on their reported interest in adding her to their ranks.
However, being adaptable is critical, and there are times when marshalling a threat in that way is not the appropriate method.
Mikolajová has demonstrated during her short career so far that she can switch between different styles of defending.
In this case, Slavia Praha Ženy’s Martina Šurnovská is looking to move the ball into a position from which she can send it forward and into the path of Czech Republic forward Karolína Křivská, who is making a run and who is looking to offer a forward passing option that would take the ball inside the St.
Pölten goal area, and it appears on initial glances as though the Czech side have the time and space needed to create a shot on goal.
However, to think that way would be to discount the quality of Mikolajová in these moments, with her consistently demonstrating that she can deal with tricky situations like this and can ensure that her side are as robust as possible whenever they are under siege.
Here, she once again tracks her Slovakia teammate but doesn’t look to make a tackle at any point, with her instead focusing on limiting the angle that she has available to find Křivská, leading to the pass arriving at the feet of Jennifer Klein instead.
As a result, what looked like a dangerous situation ended up with the ball being safely cleared from danger, and that would not have happened without Mikolajová working hard and once again helping to bring the attack to a controlled end.
Therefore, the reported Juventus target is just as effective at defending in more open spaces as she is in close-quarter battles, and that once again reflects show she is a versatile player who can bring different things to the table and who will be the perfect fit for a number of shapes and systems wherever she ends up.
Given the running theme throughout the analysis about Mikolajová being able to play on the front foot and further back, it perhaps goes without saying that she can also be just as dominant when defending higher up the pitch too.
This has been hinted at previously when she broke up Brann’s attempt to build from the back, but it is illustrated more clearly here through the high regains that she has made for her nation, with Slovakia more inclined to play this way than St.
Pölten.
As can be seen, she made 15 counterpressing recoveries and six dangerous recoveries throughout Slovakia’s six matches in the Nations League and in many different areas of the pitch.
She has also contributed nine counterpressing recoveries and two dangerous recoveries during their Nations League play-off matches against Latvia and the same numbers for each statistic in the Euro 2025 qualifying campaign.
Any side interested in signing her would be getting a player who can defend on the front foot too, which makes her a very attractive prospect in the modern game.
Conclusion
In conclusion, this tactical analysis has looked in detail at the impact that Mária Mikolajová has had on both St. Pölten Frauen’s and Slovakia’s play.
It is clear that she has been a key part of both teams’ recent form and has helped them to gain some favourable results of late.
With the midfielder linked with a move to Juventus this summer, the ultimate question that needs to be asked is whether she would be a good addition for the Turin side to make as they try to take on reigning champions Roma Femminile and regain their position at the summit of the Italian women’s game.
On paper, it does appear as though she would be, with her ability to contribute in multiple ways and adapt to any systems and shapes that new head coach Canzi might utilise.
However, there is some doubt as to whether she will make a move.
The interest has not been reported too heavily, and Juventus have made other signings in the areas that she might be used in, suggesting that she may not be a priority target for them this summer.
Nevertheless, there are ways that she could fit into the team.
They may be looking for another transitional midfielder following the loss of Canada international Julia Grosso to the Chicago Red Stars.
Their ambition in the market already means a move would not be out of the question.
It will undoubtedly be something to keep an eye on between now and the commencement of the new campaign.
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