Maccabi Haifa-Juve 2-0: Atzili’s brace, one-step elimination

Juventus’ Champions League is hanging by the thread of arithmetic. The 2-0 defeat at Maccabi Haifa, who was last in the group and fourth-seeded, beaten 3-1 a week ago in Turin, makes the Lady no longer master of her own destiny: without the right results on the other fields, it will not even be enough for her to win the two remaining matches with Psg and Benfica – with whom she lost in the first leg – to avoid the elimination in the first phase of the Champions League which has not happened to the Bianconeri since 2013-14, Antonio Conte’s last year. And being joined by the Israelis, dragged by a brace from Atzili (at 7 ‘and 42’), also puts at risk the passage to the Europa League as third in the group. When it rains, it hails: a new muscle injury by Di Maria causes fear of another stop by Fideo.

HIT AND SINKED

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The tongue immediately beats where the tooth hurts, that is Allegri’s choice to take the field with a 4-4-2 obviously asymmetrical, rather than crooked, with Cuadrado on the left on the same band as Alex Sandro and McKennie instead on the right in front of Danilo, from where disasters rain. Three photocopied actions in four minutes: Cornud’s cross from the left and a chance for Maccabi. On the first (at 3 ‘) he crowns Pierrot central jumping on Rugani and saves Szczesny, on the second save in a corner, until the third clue proves, or rather the goal, deserved: in the center of the area Atzili alone, with Rugani arriving late , twists her with his back, just enough to slip in a not innocent Szczesny.

BOXER PLAYED

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Juve is a played boxer who continues to suffer: at 12 ‘Chery on a free kick takes the crossbar, a minute later Atzili on the counterattack forces a corner, and we are not yet quarter of an hour. In fact it continues to hail: at half an hour David claims a penalty for a touch of Bonucci’s arm, but there is nothing for the Var; at 35 ‘still a cross from the left of Cornud triggers a shot of Atzili wide of a breath. So at 42 ‘comes the doubling: Pierrot in the open field finds Juve unbalanced and uncovered on the right, where he fishes Atzili – left alone by Alex Sandro who had concentrated – who at seven on the near post slips the doubling.

WITHOUT FIDEO

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Yet the moment of dismay is another, which takes away every word of mouth. Minute 22, Di Maria looks for the shot on the counterattack and yet the race ends immediately: the Fideo touches himself behind the right thigh, in the upper part, looks bewildered at the bench and asks for the change. He was supposed to be the one who turned on the light, and he had been in the first leg, which however remains his only game of the season for 90 minutes, the only one (except the first of the league) in which he has played more than once, and that so far he had already missed six of the twelve seasonal races. The exams will arrive to establish the recovery times, immediately it is the event that serves, more than any other previous technical evidence, to move Cuadrado to the right at full range, with Danilo going up and McKennie to attack the spaces.

THAT PENALTY

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Immediately before the break Vlahovic has on his head, on a cross from Cuadrado from the right, the ball that would reopen the game, and another happens to him in the quarter of an hour of the restart, but still too limp to affect. Less flimsy, certainly less stunned, more present and active, is Juve that comes back to the field with Kostic for McKennie and Locatelli instead of a bad Paredes. A completely different posture beyond men, yet in terms of vigor the reaction lasts about ten minutes. Here and there, between one waste and another on the Israeli counterattack, at 54 ‘Rugani headed close to the goal thwarted in flight by Cohen and at 67’ Cornud landslide in the area on Cuadrado invaded towards the goal, yet incredibly also the Var he says it’s not a foul: not even the episode that could have reopened it goes as it should. The entry of Kean and Soulé changes little and it is not even them that it would be right to ask. Juve sinks, without a life jacket.