Pre-season Live Match: Brondby v. Juventus

By: roberto | July 23rd, 2008

Tonight in Denmark, Juventus will hope to erase their 0-1 loss to Piacenza earlier this month with a victory against Copenhagen’s finest. The Bianconeri will square off against Brondby IF, in what I consider as our last pre-season warm-up match. The real tests of strength and character heading into our 2008-09 Serie A campaign, will come in August as we visit the U.K. for some tea with the Queen. Nevertheless, now’s the time our man Ranieri will be working hard to test, organize, and assemble the pieces of the puzzle that will hopefully best represent our team’s winning lineage this year. Therefore, by no means should any player of ours take any game (including this one) lightly.

Before the whistle blows to start this match, let’s talk about our line-up. Ranieri has decided to leave Del Piero, Camoranesi, Poulsen, Marchionni, Tiago, Almiron, Knezevic, plus youth players Pasquato and Vecchione in Italy to continue their training before Saturday’s bigger friendly against Borussia Dortmund. Also since De Ceglie, Marchisio, and Giovinco are away on Olimpic duty, we should only expect to see Amauri, Buffon, Chiellini, Ekdal, Grygera, Iaquinta, Legrottaglie, Mellberg, Molinaro, Nedved, Salihamidzic, Sissoko, Trezeguet, Zanetti, Zebina, and maybe some youngsters in this one. Will it be enough for Brondby? It certainly should be. However, you can guarantee the home team will come to play. Enjoy the match ragazzi!

FIRST HALF: BRONDBY - JUVENTUS
Poulsen would have probably loved this chance to play against his native country’s side. By the looks of it, there seems to be a fair amount of Juventus jerseys amidst the sea of yellow home kits. No doubt, Poulsen’s signing influenced more than just one.

01′ Looks like our defense is Molinaro, Lego, Mellberg, Zebina. Our Midfield is Nedved, Ekdal, Zanetti, Salihams. And up top it’s Iaquinta with Amauri. This should be interesting!

03′ Both teams feelings themselves out in the beginning of this one. No real flow to the game for Juve as of yet but that will certainly change once we start passing more.

05′ No shots on goal for either team yet but the Danish look to be more threatening as they quickly get off two shots wide of Buffon.

08′ Juve’s first chance comes off of Amauri’s head but he fails to test Brondby’s keeper. Good work from Juve now as they keep the ball on the ground.

13′ Molinaro of all people look sharp early on as he connects nicely with Nedved on the left for a few one-two’s. Nedved gets Juventus’ first shot on net with a left-footed grounder outside of the 18-yard box. Easy save as it was right to the keeper.

16′ Nedved gives a lovely pass up the field to Iaquinta who then loses it to his defender. The Czech is really running hard out there in midfield. What else is new?

17′ Amauri shows his strength on the ball as he holds off two men at the top of box to sneak a shot between the legs of one of Brondby’s defenders. Too bad it was right at the keeper. Better work now from the Bianconeri as they’re beginning to show their class.

21′ Salihams has a go 25-yards out and scuff’s it! lol The Bosnian wishes he could have that one back. Nice build up though from Juve. Mellberg and Lego got together on that one for a few nice exchanges back there.

23′ What a left foot! Number 27 just misses the target as Brondby surprise Juve from distance with another shot just wide of Buffon.

25′ Juve had another chance on net this time with a free-kick just outside of the box after their goalkeeper mishandled the ball. Iaquinta fires off a rocket but the wall did it’s job to keep the score 0-0.

29′ Wow this ref looks exactly like Collina. Holly Fuck.

32′ Salihams does well to intercept a long ball as Juventus begin to enjoy the majority of possession.

Brondby v. Juventus

35′ GOALLLLLLLL!!!!! Amauri continues his hot pre-season form as he heads in a high cross from the left wing. The big man used all of his height there to win that ball in front of a couple defenders. Forza Juve!!! 0-1

36′ Looking for a second, Amauri goes for goal again off of a nice through ball courtesy of Nedved. The striker missed just wide though, as perhaps he should have laid out a pass for a wide-open streaking Salihams to his right.

42′ GOOOAAALLL!!!!! Iaquinta scores a beauty of a goal with a great individual effort. He absolutely blew right by his man with some incredible speed down the left side then he calmly slotted it by the keeper in close range to make it 0-2 Juventus!!!!

The Collina look-alike blows the whistle after a different Juventus side, from the one that started this game, finished the half two goals up. Amuari and Iaquinta both scored very individual goals so it is still unclear if they can work together like ADP and T-Rez. However with service like our midfield behind them, who cares?

SECOND HALF: BRONDBY - JUVENTUS

45′ Second half is under way with Ranieri making changes as expected. The youngster Fausto Rossi comes in for Amauri, as the majestic Trezeguet comes in for the other goal scorer Iaquinta. Also, there are now two Czechs on the pitch as Grygera was put in Zebina’s place.

50′ A quick start to this half from the home team as they enjoy a bit of possession inside our half. Nothing comes of it thought as our defence is handling it with ease.

54′ Just as I say that, Brondby hit the crossbar off of a quick cross from the right. That left everyone standing still as the cross came out of nowhere.

55′ Oh no! Penalty shot for Brondby! The Danish side are riding a wave of momentum right now as they’re awarded a spot kick after Lego took out the man, not the ball, inside Juve’s box.

56′ He shoots, he scores. Brondby pull one back to make it 1-2. Fuck!

57′ Juventus need to be careful here as they’ve given the home team something to cheer about. Brondby are riding high right now and if they get another goal we’ll be up shit creek without paddle.

61′ Oh God, they don’t stop the pressure as the home team nail another one off the post this time! Why won’t they just die!

62′ Going the other way Juventus almost have a penalty called in their favour as Nedved goes down in their box but Collina deems it a fair challenge.

64′ In a surprise move, Ranieri subs off Buffon for Chimenti. Maybe it’s the right call and I’m just really really into this game even though it means nothing. Ranieri also subs off Lego for the monster Chiellini, and brings on Esposito for Nedved.

Brondby v. Juventus

68′ Ekdal is really working hard in our midfield along with Salihams to bring this game back down to reality and into Juventus’ grasp. I’ve never seen Ekdal play before but he’s impressing me with his grit as well as his touch for passing. Tiago who?

71′ Juventus are really working hard now to pressure Brondby with every touch they have on the ball. They’re causing a lot of turnovers and if they can keep up the pressure Juventus will go back up two soon.

72′ Esposito catches a nasty high foot and the ref doesn’t hand out a yellow! What the fuck was the ref thinking there? He might look like Collina but he is nowhere near his ability.

73′ T-Rez takes a through ball first-time into the top right corner of the net, but he’s called offside. Too bad as he ripped it up there nicely.

75′ Some more subs for Juve as Sissoko comes in for Ekdal and another youngster Ariaudo comes in for Mellberg. This is really turning into a great display for our youth to show us what they’ve got. Least we forget our three biggest prospects aren’t even playing in this one.

81′ Brondby is now on their 127th sub of the match… Fuck where do they find them all?

85′ Looks to me like both teams have already subbed out all of the goal scoring in this one so I expect the score to remain 1-2 Juventus.

88′ Brondby with a nice left-footed volley that goes wide left of Chimenti, followed by a nice Salihams drop-shot the other way that misses, should probably be the last two plays of this match.

90′+ The half-retarded Collina look-alike blows this one dead as it ends 1-2 Brondby - Juventus.

FINAL SCORE: BRONDBY - JUVENTUS 1-2