The final month of the 2025-26 season started with great hope. After Como suffered some crucial negative results in May, we went into the month knowing that a few wins in May would secure a spot in the top four and qualification for next season’s UEFA Champions League League Stage.
But, as has happened many times in the last few years, Juventus collapsed under the pressure.
The Bianconeri secured only one win out of four games in May as we ended the 2025-26 season in sixth place and will be playing
in the UEFA Europa League next season. Let’s review the misery of the disappointing end to the season.
Failure
It was déjà vu all over again in the first game of May at home to Hellas Verona. We completely dominated and yet once again conceded from our first shot on target. Scottish striker Kieron Bowie scored after taking advantage of a rare but critical mistake from Gleison Bremer, who gifted Verona the ball. That said, Michele Di Gregorio was poor at his near post from Bowie’s shot and should have done better to keep it out. The soon-to-be outgoing Dusan Vlahovic rescued a point for us when his brilliant free kick flew past goalkeeper Lorenzo Montipò. Unfortunately, like so many times this season, we were unable to provide the killer blow in a game we should have easily won: 1-1.
We returned to winning ways with a hard-fought 1-0 victory over relegation-battling Lecce. Vlahovic scored the fastest goal in his career after 12 seconds when he collected a cross from Cambiaso, turned past defender Gabriel, and smashed it into the roof of the net. It was a busy opening phase of the match as Lecce almost equalized immediately after the opener but Di Gregorio saved well from Walid Cheddira’s shot. Francisco Conceição then hit the crossbar after receiving a wonderful pass from Manuel Locatelli in the right channel.
The game calmed down a bit after that until a flurry of action in the second half. First, Vlahovic scored his second of the match on the rebound after Cambiaso’s shot, but the Serb was offside from the first shot. Pierre Kalulu then scored as well but, remarkably, Vlahovic was again offside in the buildup of the attack roughly 23 years prior to the goal. The Bianconeri held on for a much-needed 1-0 victory.
Then, everything fell apart.
For the 16th time of the season, we conceded a goal from the opponents’ first shot on target when Cher Ndour’s shot took a small deflection and Di Gregorio let it squeeze past him at the near post. Once again, we scored two disallowed goals: first, Weston McKennie scored a header but the referee ruled that a puff of wind hit the defender McKennie committed a foul on Robin Gosens when the two jumped for the header. Then, Vlahovic scored another goal from an offside position. Rolando Mandragora, one of those players who do nothing useful all season except when playing against Juventus, scored with a spectacular shot from the edge of the box to effectively knock the Bianconeri out of Champions League participation for next season: 2-0.
The Derby Della Mole felt like a futile match given the miracle that was needed to enable us to secure a spot in the Top 4. But since there was still a chance, no matter how little, we had to try, despite the horrendous crowd trouble that occurred before the game outside of the Stadio Olimpico Grande Torino that delayed kickoff for an hour.
And try we did, for the first hour of the game. Vlahovic scored in the 24th minute after a nice passing move involving Khephren Thuram and Kalulu. The Bianconeri scored from a fantastic counterattack in the second half led by Conceição and Vlahovic, with the Portuguese winger assisting Vlahovic to score his second goal of the match. But Torino roared back and completely flipped the script in the final 30 minutes of the match through two substitutes. For the 17th time of the season, we conceded a goal from the opponents’ first attempt on target when Cesare Casadei headed in a corner after weak marking from Cambiaso. The equalizer came from another corner as Casadei again won a header that forced a great save from Mattia Perin, but Che Adams eventually scored from the rebound with a deflected shot: 2-2.
It was a miserable and deflating end to another wasted season.
Juventus Women
Juventus Women had a month full of goals scored … and conceded. First, we saw a thrilling 3-2 victory over Napoli in the league. Lindsey Thomas scored in the fifth minute after nice combination play between Michela Cambiaghi and Ana Capeta. Napoli quickly equalized through Marija Banusic, but Capeta then went from provider to goalscorer when she pounced on a mistake from the Napoli goalkeeper and scored. The first half continued at a breakneck pace as Cecilie Floe equalized two minutes later to bring Napoli back into the game again. The second half was much calmer and saw only one goal: an 82nd minute winner from the outgoing Paulina Krumbiegel: a cracking 3-2 victory!
The Bianconere then tied 3-3 with Inter in another thrilling game. Remarkably, all six goals came in the first half. Chiara Robustellini gave Inter the lead in the second minute but defender Ivana Andreas scored an own goal from a corner to bring us back into the match. Robustellini scored her second from a thumping header but Inter conceded a penalty for a handball in the box; Barbara Bonansea scored it in her record 241st appearance for the club.
Amalie Vangsgaard then gifted Inter their own penalty after fouling Elisa Bartoli in the box. Tessa Wullaert stepped up to convert the penalty. Juventus equalized for the third time in less than 45 minutes as Vangsgaard corrected her error and scored from Mathilde Harviken’s excellent lay-off. The second half, while eventful, was nowhere near as crazy as the first and the score remained at 3-3.
We ended the Serie A season with a 3-1 away win over Parma. For the third consecutive game, there was a goal in the first ten minutes as Emma Godo scored with a low, driven free kick in the ninth minute. Annalise Rasmussen doubled our lead when she scored from the rebound after the goalkeeper saved Cambiaghi’s shot. Parma pulled one back in the 80th minute through Gaia Distefano but Thomas finished the game off in the last minute after picking up a great pass from Bonansea on the counterattack and lobbing the goalkeeper.
Juventus lost 1-0 to AS Roma in the Coppa Italia final in what proved to be coach Massimiliano Canzi’s final game as manager of the team. It was a balanced game that Juventus slightly edged with a few better chances than Roma, but the margins were extremely small. The lack of action in the game likely came as a result of the extremely high temperatures on the day and Bonansea even asked to be substituted due to what seemed to be heat exhaustion.
Roma scored the decisive goal through Manuela Giugliano when she controlled a flicked-on cross from Evelyne Vien and scored from close range.
Champions/Europa League
After years of scraping by to qualify for the Champions League and performing pitifully in the competition, we finally got what we deserved: failure to qualify for next season’s edition of the competition. Next season, we have the distinguished honor of representing Italy in the Europa League along with our fellow fallen giants AC Milan.
We’ve talked a lot about what went wrong this season in our season-review episode on the podcast and on the season ratings (and we’ll probably talk about it more in the offseason!), but I want to talk about my concern for Italian teams playing in next season’s Champions League: Como, Inter, Roma, and Napoli.
Inter are by far and away the best team in Italy and ended the season with an 11-point lead over second-place Napoli. But even Inter had a poor campaign in the Champions League last season and were shockingly knocked out by Bodø/Glimt in the play-off round. Napoli were the worst of the lot and ended in 30th place in the league phase. We all know how we did, so the less said the better. Atalanta represented Italy the best, but unfortunately came up against the juggernaut that is Bayern Munchen.
Allegri will (likely) replace Conte as manager at Napoli next season. While he had a miserable end to his time at Milan, he remains one of the most experienced coaches in the UCL, so they’ll be a wildcard next season in the competition. Inter likely won’t make the same mistakes but their European failures last season has set them further behind heavyweights like PSG, Bayern, and (now) Arsenal.
Como and Roma are the two teams I really want to focus on. While people praised Como and, to a lesser extent, Roma for their playing style and (especially in Como’s case) entertaining and positive football, the stats show that they weren’t all that much better than Juventus.
The Bianconeri had essentially the same number of shots on target this season (227) as Inter did (229), which shows both how stunningly efficient Inter’s attack was (89 goals) compared to ours (58 goals) but also how much our attack under-performed. Meanwhile, Roma (178 SOT) and Como (194 SOT) had fewer shots on target. Again, their forwards were clearly more efficient than ours. To summarize a few key attacking metrics:
- Inter: 478 shots, 229 on target, 89 goals, 175 accurate forward passes per game, average possession of 59.8% per game
- Juventus: 455 shots, 227 on target, 61 goals, 167 accurate forward passes per game, average possession of 57.6% per game
- Como: 408 shots, 194 on target, 65 goals, 170 accurate forward passes per game, average possession of 61.6% per game
- Roma: 366 shots, 178 on target, 59 goals, 162 accurate forward passes per game, average possession of 56.3% per game
- Napoli: 367 shots, 179 on target, 58 goals, 182 accurate forward passes per game, average possession of 59.0% per game
My point is this: Despite the image of Como and Roma being attacking, breath-of-fresh air, new style teams, they weren’t that much better than Juventus on the pitch. Their respective places in the Champions League next season are deserved, but if they weren’t that much better than us then I fear for their fate in the competition.
Why does this matter? If Italian teams keep faltering in European competition(s), then that dreaded coefficient is going to continue worsening and we risk losing the fourth direct qualification spot. If you think we struggle now to qualify for the Champions League, then it’s going to be even worse if that happens.
