April 6, 2026.
That was the last time that Juventus had gone into the half up 2-0 or better until Sunday’s matchup against Lecce.
That April 6 match against Genoa saw Juve go 2-0 up on goals from Bremer and Weston McKennie and hold that advantage for the rest of the match. It took the Bianconeri a little longer at the Stadio Via del Mare, but it was finally McKennie in the 29th minute who nestled a lofted free kick from Douglas Luiz into the net to open the scoring. Luiz then struck himself four minutes
shy of the break with a long-range strike that came off the hand of goalkeeper Wladimiro Falcone and then off the inside of the post.
It was a day of firsts in the Juve midfield: McKennie’s first goal of the season, Luiz’s first goal and first assist in a Juventus shirt (it’s only been two years and a quarter or so), and the first time in Luiz’s career he’d ever had one of each.
It wasn’t an explosive, dominant win that evoked visions of a team turning the corner — frankly, I don’t think we can expect that until the biggest players on the club’s titanic injury list finally return — and there were moments of the second half where that two-goal lead felt anything but secure. But after the demoralizing loss to Lazio last week and the infuriating draw against Rennes in midweek, a victory of any kind is a welcome, and Juve did hold that 2-0 victory to hopefully start a small run of momentum heading into what should be a winnable run of games.
Luciano Spalletti came into the match under intense pressure, and dealing with an even longer injury list after losing two more players, Nico González and Zeki Çelik, on Thursday. They joined Kenan Yildiz, Manuel Locatelli, Khéphren Thuram, Francisco Conceição, Jeff Ekhator, and Kamil Grabara on the injured list. Spalletti replicated his 3-4-1-2 setup from Thursday’s game against Rennes, with two changes. Guglielmo Vicario started behind the three-man back line of Federico Gatti, Bremer, and Jhon Lucumí. Pierre Kalulu and Andrea Cambiaso took up the wing-back spots around the midfield pivot of Luiz and Teun Koopmeiners. McKennie took up station in the hole behind Nick Woltemade and Randal Kolo Muani.
Lecce manager Eusebio Di Francesco won his 200th career game last week against Udinese. He was missing midfield mainstay Lassana Coulibaly, Ivan Ilic, Santiago Perotti, and Medon Berisha, but set up his remaining charges in his usual 4-3-3. Falcone captained the team from between the sticks, covered by the defense of Danilo Veiga, Kialonda Gaspar, Tiago Gabriel, and Antonino Gallo. Youssef Maleh, Oumar Ngom, and Mohamed Kaba were the midfield trio, while Konan N’Dri, Willem Geubbels, and Amar Fatah formed the attacking trident.
The game very nearly started with a disaster. Seconds after the opening whistle, Vicario let himself be closed down by N’Dri and was lucky to see the latter’s deflection of his pass fly wide of the post. He very nearly let it happen again on the ensuing goal kick before he was finally able to get the ball out of danger.
The overall offense didn’t look all that much better than it has in the last few games. Individual players like McKennie would get the ball into good positions only for no one to be able to do anything with it — or the reverse, like when Kolo Muani made a good run into the middle of the box only for Cambiaso to miss him by several yards with the pass. Neither team managed a shot over the first 20 minutes, and Juve were closing in on half an hour without taking a shot as they lined up to take a free kick in the middle of the field about 40 yards from goal.
Koopmeiners had been standing over it while referee Fabio Maresca dealt with any shenanigans in the box, and just as he blew his whistle Luiz stepped back and snapped a floated ball into the middle of the box. McKennie made a perfect run to it and beat Falcone, who got himself caught in no man’s land.on the slide, side-footing it past the keeper to pay dirt.
Just a few minutes later, Kolo Muani might’ve doubled the lead, but Koopmeners’ headed cross bounced off his shin and behind the goal, then Bremer missed a quick header off a corner kick. But Juve sent the goal kick right back where it came from, and after a quick series of passes got the ball upfield, Gatti squared the ball off to Luiz, who hit a first-time shot from outside the box. Falcone dove and got a hand to it, but couldn’t push it far enough. It pinged off the inside of the post and nestled into the net to double the Juve lead.
The visitors went into the half having controlled 66 percent of possession. That quickly changed as the second period began. Within five minutes Lecce had forced two saves out of Vicario — neither particularly tricky — and had forced another two last-ditch blocks to keep the keeper from having to make a play. They slowly forced Juve onto the defensive, while the Bianconeri had to fling the ball upfield to try to generate any offense on the counter.
The pressure started to get to Juve as the half wore on, and some uncharacteristic mistakes began to creep into their attempts at breaking out. Lucumí overran his own dribble and gave the ball away deep, but Maleh fired his shot well wide. With about 20 minutes left Geubbles was put into a good position into the channel and really ought to have at least forced something out of Vicario, but fired over instead.
Vicario himself misplaced a few passes to leave Lecce with a short field. Additional saves against Paco Esteban and N’Dri seemed to mark the end of the real push. In the last 10 minutes Lecce’s attack petered out and Juve finally regained some semblance of equilibrium. Jérémie Boga and Juan Cabal— yes, Juan Cabal played in this game of the season — each fired shots high in those last 10, the latter coming from relatively close range. The game’s final phases were dominated by the last-minute red card to Gaspar, who clearly crossed a line with Maresca while arguing over the award of a late corner kick, with the referee not even bothering to pull out a second yellow (Gaspar had been booked in the 76th minute) and simply went for a straight red instead.
The final whistle came seconds later, and the Bianconeri were headed back to Turin with three important points.
