Juventus 3 – Genoa 1: initial reaction and random observations

You wanted some style points, you got them.

And something else.

Holy cow The goals Juventus scored against Genoa in Tuesday night’s 3-1 victory at Luigi Ferraris were the moments of individual brilliance this team can show, but also the kind of setting “Whatever you can do, I can do better … “It seems the goal-setting bar in this game was set incredibly high from the first.

The good part of all this?

About five seconds before Paulo Dybala scored his goal in the Genoa defense, I was sitting at my desk and turning on ESPN +. Until then, Juventus had not scored a goal, but it seemed that it was not as terrible as some of the performances of the first half that we have seen in the matches of Bologna and Lecce. (Those weren’t great!)

So basically what I’m trying to say is that Juventus just needed me to watch. Obviously.

/ read the room /

/ immediately leaves /

This is what we wanted to see from this team knowing full well that when Tuesday night’s game started, Lazio had just reduced Juve’s lead to a single point in Serie A. The pressure to respond to Lazio was there, as much as it was. so that Juventus doesn’t shoot himself in the foot (again) during a trip to Marassi. It has been a house of horrors – there are plenty of other ways to describe it, believe me, for Juventus in recent years, and this was seen as another potential place where Juve could slide if they didn’t keep their performance together. .

Fortunately for us, we saw three of the best goals we have seen throughout the season.

Seeing who scored those goals: Dybala, Cristiano Ronaldo and Douglas Costa, it might not come as a surprise to see them doing that kind of thing. That being said, seeing three such goals presented in one game: hell, HALF! – and that they arrive at a moment in the title race where Juventus could have seen that their margin of error would almost entirely disappear if things didn’t go well in Genoa, that’s what makes them even better.

Despite Genoa being a team that is not very good at all and in a battle not to be relegated to Serie B, Juve needed their great players to step forward tonight. And with three moments of brilliance leading to goals, Juventus’ attack stars did just that.

It’s not wrong to see just moments after leaving an hour-long business meeting. So from me, Juventus, thanks for giving us something to be happy about. We need more of that these days, and if that means scoring a nice goal after another goal, then so be it, my friends.

The more you want to make that normal, then go ahead.

You won’t find anyone around here complaining about it.

RANDOM THOUGHTS AND OBSERVATIONS

• If people here or in the Italian press had any idea about Miralem Pjanic’s loss of interest now that he knows he will be going to Barcelona in a few months, let’s see how he reacted to Dybala’s goal, okay?

Photo of Daniele Badolato – Juventus FC / Juventus FC via Getty Images

Pjanic is a good guy who really seems to love his teammates. Knowing full well that he had just obtained a transfer to a new club 24 hours earlier, seeing him celebrate like this was a good reminder that he certainly loves the current club he is in.

• Oh, and by the way, Pjanic also did this against Genoa: 101 touches, 92.4 percent complete passes and recorded his first assist in Serie A since NOVEMBER. That will be fine.
• There was a brief discussion on Twitter between me and my fellow cohort BWRAO Hunter after Ronaldo’s goal: Who wouldn’t want to celebrate their goal with Carlo Pinsoglio? If Gigi Buffon is basically the father of the team, then Pinsoglio is the cool guy who’s the life of the party whenever you look like him. Judging by how Pinsoglio acts on the bench and during goal celebrations, it’s probably also the life of the party when he’s at home.
• A little more fun with the stats, this is what Dybala ended up with: goal, assist, 4 key passes and completed almost 95 percent of his passes. We don’t know if Dybala has really reached his full fitness level after dealing with COVID-19 for a couple of months, but he’s damn come out of game suspension looking as good as before. (And I’m not just saying he’s handsome, even though he’s very handsome.)
• A final nugget of statistics: Juan Cuadrado had four tackles, four interceptions and led the team in touches (again) with 119. Remember, this is the start of the Juventus comeback we’re talking about here, not a central midfielder like Pjanic or Rodrigo Bentancur. That’ll do.
• Of course, you knew that Juve’s best fullback these days would be someone who’s not even a right back. This season is so stupid.
• I would love to know the reading of the radar gun on the Cristiano Ronaldo target. That has to be one of his best shots of the season. Mattia Perin is a very thoughtful goalkeeper and even he had no chance to stop that shot. It was a perfect location as well as having as much speed as any goal Ronaldo has scored this season.
• And then you have Douglas Costa’s goal, which is just ridiculous and something else.
• It’s just that kind of crazy skill that makes Costa the difference-making submarine, you know, when the game is really close, that this team needs right now. Is he the best player than Federico Bernardeschi? Yes probably. But when you look at what Costa has done in the last two games from the bench compared to when he hit the wall after 50 or 60 minutes as a starter, it’s pretty easy to see that hitting the opposition with a new Costa when they really start Getting tired is the way to go right now.
• And then you have the defense of Juventus in the goal of Genoa that was not … great. First letting the cross go through the box without touching it, and then see Juan Cuadrado being shaken from his boots. It’s just not exactly something Juve will want to have in his season finale movie. At least they have the goals from earlier in the game to stand out instead.