Marotta said.. “The journey to the stadium was better than last year, certainly, but it still doesn’t seem right that a football team has to be accompanied to the stadium by a police escort with armoured vehicles. There were some eggs thrown and a few insults, but overall not that bad.”
Mamma mia, Napuli starting as if they are playing for the Scudetto. Buffon & the linesman saved Juve's ass...
Yes, it looked like the upper part of his body was behind Asamoah, but his legs were level with Asamoah. You know if that was Juve we'd be haring conspiracy. Still, Napoli have been the better team.
MOTM so far for Juve? Buffon, without him it would easily be 3-0 or more. The rest of the team? ******** off, they're shit. Having said that, let's see them turn it around and at least get the draw.
That is as bad as Juve has played in a while. They are defending for long spells which is partially a product of being unable to combine offensively and retain position in advanced positions. They really really are depending on Tevez in helping them in that regard. Osvaldo has been poor, but Llorente worse. Llorente's poor form is really hurting Juve.
The entire team, sans Buffon, has been playing poorly. Pirlo's free kicks to nowhere and the piss poor passing by the midfield is really bad. Our defending has been shambolic at times.
Napoli came out like gang busters. They applied high pressure each time we had possession, which gave us trouble and is how to play us. Problem is that you can't do that the whole match, so they ran out of gas after 20 and relied on their counterattack. Their goal was offside but Asamoah defended poorly on that play. We can tie it up although this is the second time we have played with two #9's and we look terrible. The value Tevez gives us is that he is a #10 who links the midfield with the attack. We miss that with Llorente & Osvaldo. This is a good match to bring on Vucinic.
If Juve doesn't score in this game it will be the first game in 43 straight that we haven't scored in the league.
Mirko has been missed! Some of his play has been fantastic. If only he stayed healthy this year. Would have been interesting to see him and Tevez play more together after their fantastic start together.