This was to be a night of supreme football, of super athletes competing in a 90-minute global show of elite sports. However, explosives, shattered window screens, an injured Marc Bartra and a shocked Dortmund squad were protagonists on a bizarre and eery evening in Nordrhein-Westfalen. The torrent of events overshadowed all footballing considerations.
Some 700 km south, the notion of supreme football was also not applicable, because the gulf of class between Juventus and Barcelona was all too tangible, another chapter in the Catalan giant’s protracted defenestration as Europe’s most performing club.
This time, will Barcelona conjure up another Miracle of Nou Camp with a mercurial Neymar and an apocalyptic goal from Sergio Roberto?
Juventus =/= PSG
Juventus perhaps possess too much experience, too much finesse and too much cunning to wilt and yield with the fragility and impotence of Paris Saint-Germain in a fortnight’s time in Catalonia. The steeliness and mettle of the serial Italian champions, with Leonardo Bonucci and Giorgio Chiellini in central defence ahead of Gianluigi Buffon in goal, should not fold, not even in the face of MSN and relentless Spanish pressure.
In Turin, amid deafening noise from the home fans, who never forgave Barcelona for destroying the dream of a treble back in 2015, Massimo Allegri fielded a 4-2-3-1 formation with the clear intent of choking the opposing midfield and thereby denying Barcelona the easy route of playing through the lines. Paulo Dybala had a free role in the attacking third, and Mario Mandzukic was deployed on the left side of the attack. The Croatian tracked Sergio Roberto when the latter moved inside.
What Juventus showed in tactical application, Barcelona lacked. Enrique’s 3-4-3 formation backfired. The Spanish coach shifted Javier Mascherano forward into defensive midfield. In that position, Mascherano excelled for Argentina at the last World Cup. He opted to play Jeremy Mathieu as a third centre-back, but the Frenchman and Gerard Pique were both uncomfortable as the flanking pair of the trio. This was not PSG, this was Juventus.
‘New Messi’ overshadows the original
At the start of the second half Enrique enforced wholesale changes, moving Mascherano a line lower and replacing the nervy Mathieu with Andre Gomes, but by then perhaps the match, and the tie, was out of sight for his team. Juventus had begun the match with a single purpose: to press for an early goal, and they duly got one – in the seventh minute – thanks to the brilliance of Dybala, the brimming Argentinean finishing with a pirouette and bending finish. The new Messi supplanting the old one, who, ever-nearing his 30th birthday, can no longer muster his energetic, omnipresent movement to carry his team. Today, Messi plays in stints, in fits.
Dybala’s strike allowed Juventus to sit back, defend and lurk on the counter, a favorite pastime of the Italian team when the circumstances require it. Dybala struck again, again with aplomb and the potency of a spangled player. He took advantage of a positional mistake from Mascherano to carve open Barcelona’s midfield and matched the return ball from Mandzukic from the left perfectly with a first touch to leave Barcelona goalkeeper Marc-Andre Ter Stegen helpless.
No coming back
Juventus were emphatic and ruthlessly efficient in their performance. In the second half, as Enrique sought to re-position Barcelona in the match, Juventus sat much deeper, threatening on the counter. They were happy to keep shape and exploit gaps in Barcelona’s defence. The visitors upped the tempo, but they found a Pretorian guard in their way, marshaled by the cerebral Chiellini. Allegri’s charges were disciplined and clever, with the aptitude and attitude that have so underpinned well-drilled Juventus sides in the past.
Not that Barcelona were overly underwhelming, but a combination of static defending and poor finishing contrived to a damning 3-0 final score. In the 55th minute, Chiellini scored the third goal for the Italians.
And so, as the return leg in the Nou Camp looms, one cannot help but contemplate another great escape from Barcelona, a new 6-1 in the form of a 4-0. However, over the 90 minutes in Turin, Juventus offered plenty of countervailing evidence to that narrative, repeatedly exposing Barcelona’s many fallibilities and deficiencies that have simmered, and at times, resurfaced this season. They may again at home, against a superb Juventus.
Buy an annual Scroll Membership to support independent journalism and get special benefits.
Our journalism is for everyone. But you can get special privileges by buying an annual Scroll Membership. Sign up today!