A victory that doesn't convince and a draw that draws applause. Wednesday in the Champions League in the name of paradox for the Italians: in fact, rather than Juventus' success against Sporting Lisbon, it is Roma's equal against Chelsea. A question of the value of the opponents, but also of express play, even if in the end the points count and those, once again, smile at the black and white people. With the painful 2-1 at the Stadium, the qualifying speech is basically channeled towards a happy ending, while the Giallorossi, despite having a very good ranking (facilitated a lot by the Atletico Madrid flop, unable to go beyond the 0-0 draw on the Qarabag field ), they wasted the opportunity to mortgage second place. An evening of great emotions on both fields, with Allegri's team forced to make a tiring comeback and Di Francesco's to pass from depression to ecstasy, to then stop on the good emotional balance of the final draw.
“It's an important victory even if, objectively, we weren't brilliant – commented the Juventus coach. – At the moment we lack the best conditions, some have just returned from injuries, others have returned tired from the national teams. This is why I say that the 3 points are very positive, although we need to get back to our levels as soon as possible". And that is to win games like this without working too hard, just like in the past. We expected a bad and angry Juve after the defeat against Lazio, instead ready and go and it was Sporting Lisbon who took the lead, albeit thanks to an unfortunate own goal by Alex Sandro (12'). Pjanic's free-kick seemed to put things right immediately (28'), instead the bianconeri got bogged down in the quicksand artfully constructed by the Portuguese and had to wait until the 84th minute to complete the comeback (Mandzukic on a splendid assist by Douglas Costa). Ugly game and a lot of cynicism, the exact opposite of Rome in short. Di Francesco's team offered a great test on the field of a Chelsea that was in a bit of a crisis but still very strong, however they ended up paying for the usual defensive fragility that distinguishes them every time the bar is raised.
However, the draw remains a very good result, both for the premises at the beginning of the season (few, on the day of the draw, would have imagined the Giallorossi +3 on Atletico Madrid) and for how the match had gone: Chelsea's double advantage (11' David Luiz, 37' Hazard) foreshadowed a bad evening, however the scenarios were completely reversed. Kolarov reopened the game with a splendid individual play (40'), then in the second half Dzeko took the chair who first equalized with a left-footed volley from the cover (64'), then even gave his team the lead with a shot butt close (70'). But just when Chelsea seemed to be on the ropes, there was the usual defensive ingenuity that allowed Hazard to strike undisturbed and beat the innocent Alisson for the final 3-3 (75'). “We are sorry because when you play like this you have to win – said Di Francesco. – We have committed naiveties but I am still very satisfied, if we continue to work and express ourselves in this way we will be able to obtain great satisfaction”. At the halfway point, therefore, Juventus and Roma are second and therefore qualified: the road to the round of XNUMX is still long but all in all, that's okay.
