Juventus V Napoli could have been the perfect swansong for Alessandro Del Piero and he could have said goodbye in style. It never really felt as though Juve were 100% committed to the fixture, a little arrogance and a sense of entitlement started to seep into their game and they were never truly in it until they were 1-0 down. Amtonio Conte played this all wrong, in his efforts to appease the fans by playing Del Piero, he ultimately lost it. In reality, Del Piero and Marco Borriello were not exactly the greatest pairing, but nothing should be taken away from the amazing attacking football that was played by Napoli, in the first five minutes they had at least 4 shots on goal!! They were hungrier for this Cup as it felt as though they crumbled in the league and in Europe.
Georgio Chiellini was a big miss as Martin Caceras was not as affective down the left. The game wasn't as free flowing as I hoped an the referee let a lot of things go that led to tackles coming in faster and this then led to a lot of stop starts and the longer it stayed 0-0, the more heated it got. It was a little surprising that the game went on for 40 minutes without any yellow cards.. and yes, you guessed it, the first yellow card went to Claudio Marchisio,who looked like the walking wounded by the end of the game.
The first goal came in the 63rd minute when Marco Storari brought down Ezequiel Lavezzi and Edison Cavani slotted it home. At 1-0 Juve still had hope and their fair share of chances, yet it is the same thing with The Old Lady.. they have trouble with the finishing. This will come to bite them in the bum when it comes to knock out competitions like The Champions League, because a draw will not be enough. All hope was squashed in the 83rd minute when Marek Hamsik made it two. Tempers were at their highest because Juve had begun to realise that their unbeaten record could come to an end, and in the 90th minute Fabio Quagliarella saw a straight red for an elbow on Aronica- to be fair the Napoli man did have his arms around his neck and probably should have been booked in the first half with his kick on Marchisio in the first half which could have also been a penalty. But in the end the better team won and over 20 years without, Napoli deserved it. But Juve can take this as a lesson in humility, and maybe they should party less and they should never underestimate their opponents- because complacency and overconfidence will lead to you being kicked to the kerb!!!
Having said all that, Juve had a remarkable season and lifting the Scudetto is the perfect way to say goodbye to a legend like Alessandro Del Piero.
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