Over the last month Juventus have, for once, had the favor of the football gods. The teams they’ve been competing with for Serie A’s final Champions League spot have hemorrhaged points in recent weeks, allowing a Juventus team that a month ago looked like they were all but beaten to head into the final four games of the season in control of their own destiny.
The gods continued to smile on the Bianconeri this weekend. Como and Napoli drew on Saturday, and AC Milan’s shocking loss to Sassuolo (ANCORA
BERARDI!) had given them an opening to match them in third place. All they had to do was beat a Hellas Verona team that had been mathematically relegated two days earlier.
But this time, Juve couldn’t take advantage of the chance.
That phrase is true both in the macrocosm of the league race and the microcosm of the match itself. Juventus completely dominated, controlling nearly 80 percent of the possession and outshooting their opponents 29-7. Alas, only seven of those shots found the target, and only onev—va fantastic free kick by Dusan Vlahovic — managed to get past a brilliant Lorenzo Montipò. By the time Vlahovic did score, Montipò had been protecting a lead for the better part of 30 minutes, having scored after a calamitous mistake by Gleison Bremer gifted them the opener. Juve pushed and pushed for the goal that would give them the three points that would push their lead out to four points. But it wasn’t to be — in large part thanks to some insane saves by Montipò.
And so Juventus could only manage a 1-1 draw against a team that only has three more games of top-flight football left in its immediate future. Como remained three points behind, and Roma, who play Fiorentina on Monday, were presented the chance to pull within one should they win.
Luciano Spalletti was missing only Arkadiusz Milik and Juan Cabal, and Kenan Yildiz was deemed fit to start after two straight matches coming off the bench in the midst of his nagging knee inflammation. He sent out a 3-4-2-1 formation, anchored in goal by Michele Di Gregorio. Pierre Kalulu, Bremer, and Lloyd Kelly played in front of him, with Weston McKennie and Andrea Cambiaso serving as wing-backs. Manuel Locatelli and Khéphren Thuram stood in midfield, while Francisco Conceição and Yildiz supported Jonathan David in attack.
Paolo Sammarco’s team was simply looking to go out with some pride. He had far more pieces missing than his opposite number did. Armel Bella-Kotchap, Cheikh Niassi, Daniel Oyegoke, Suat Serdar, and Daniel Mosquera were all ruled out by injuries, while Nicolas Valentini served a suspension and Gift Orban was dropped after a physical altercation with a fan was caught on camera two weeks ago. Sammarco deployed a 3-5-1-1. Montipò was between the sticks, with Victor Nelsson, Martin Frese, and Andrias Edmundsson playing in the back three. Rafik Belghali and Domagoj Bradaric were on the wings, flanking the midfield of Antoine Bernede, Roberto Gagliardini, and Jean-Daniel Akpa Akpro. Tomás Suslov roamed behind Kieron Bowie up front.
Juve seized the initiative with alacrity. Within seven minutes they had put a ball on target, albeit a relatively weak header from Kelly that Montipò didn’t have trouble with. A training ground piece on a free kick saw Locatelli’s long shot bend wide, then Conceição was denied by a smart save when he slammed a defensive clearance low and to the near post.
The 26th minute saw Juve recycle a corner and loft the ball back into the box, where Bremer deftly flicked a header that got over Montipò’s hand but didn’t dip enough and bounced off the crossbar.
You’ll notice that there hasn’t been much mention of Verona possessing the ball. That’s because they weren’t—and they hadn’t taken a shot until the 34th minute, when Bremer made a catastrophic error. The Brazilian had easily taken down a cross by Bradaric off his chest and was relatively unpressured when he tried to pass the ball out wide to Kalulu. The idea for the pass wasn’t bad. The execution was horrific. He left the pass a good yard short, and Bradaric pounced, quickly centering the ball to Bowie. The Scot didn’t connect with the ball particularly well, and Di Gregorio absolutely should have saved the ball. But he was already cheating to the far post and was caught completely off-guard when Bowie went for the near, leaving him only able to flail a leg at the ball as it rolled into the goal.
Juve looked to respond quickly, but Thuram’s header off a good cross from McKennie was blocked by Nelsson. The Mastini registered three more blocks before the half was out, and went into the locker rooms incredibly unlikely halftime leaders.
Spalletti took immediate action coming out of the tunnel. Thuram was replaced by Vlahovic, changing the formation to a 4-2-3-1 and moving David into a No. 10 role behind the Serb. They dominated the game once again, but were reduced to probing the Verona defense for the first 15 minutes of the half. The turning point came on the hour when Conceição was fouled by Bernede. The team had struggled all year from direct free kicks, but the return of Vlahovic brought back their biggest threat from dead balls, and Vlahovic reminded everyone how skilled he was by ripping the ball around the wall and past the near post of Montipò, who had cheated a step the other way and couldn’t recover.
Suslov tried to respond with a long range shot that had neither the power nor the direction to give Di Gregorio any trouble. Montipò, on the other hand, had a much higher degree of difficulty less than a minute later when Cambiaso accelerated through the defense, got the ball back from Yildiz, and lofted a beautiful cross toward Concieção at the back post. The Portuguese stuck a foot out and directed it on frame, but Montipò was able to block the ball with his knee. The ball was recycled and eventually found Cambiaso again, who lifted a back post cross again. This time the diminutive winger got his head to the ball, and Montipò made an even crazier kick-save with his trailing leg before Frese cleared it behind.
Jérémie Boga was brought on from the bench for an ineffective David, but his attempt to turn fellow sub Edon Zhegrova’s cross in at the near post was blocked into Montipò‘s hands. Juve continued to have shot after shot blocked as they desperately poured forward to look for the winner. Zhegrova nearly had it in the third minute of stoppage time when he took a neat pass from Boga, cut inside, and unleashed a worm-burner at the near post, but Montipò had one last trick in his back, poking the ball off the post with one hand, the rebound rolling up his side before being cleared.
A final effort a minute or so later by Fabio Miretti came right at the keeper, and Montipò put the finishing touch on his performance by punching a last-gasp free kick from the right wing, drawing the final whistle and the match.
