Rome reigns, Juve deludes: the renaissance of Italian football

Night of dreams, cups and champions. Nights before the World Cup. And even if the most prestigious European club event is now called the Champions League, those evenings, those emotions, those palpitations remain the same, even more than thirty years after the famous song by Antonello Venditti. Artist chosen not by chance in these nights that first turned a dream into a nightmare, with the failure of Italy to qualify for Russia 2018 and then laid the foundations for the rebirth of Italian football. At least on a continental level for national teams.
No one, or perhaps some isolated visionary, would have bet a cent at 8.45 pm on Tuesday 10 April on the double Italian remuntada against the two Spanish superpowers, by virtue of two heavy liabilities as boulders accrued in the first leg. And instead “Romantada” was there, and it missed a breath that it was double, demonstrating the beauty of a sport that is never like in these days and a metaphor for life. Because you have to try, because it’s worth fighting even when everything seems to be already written, because there would have been no Italy Germany 4-3 without Karl Heinz Schnellinger’s last-minute goal .
The lesson comes directly from prof. Eusebio Di Francesco who, after failing to defeat at the Camp Nou despite a too severe and lying result (1-4), wraps Valverde and Catalan arrogance with an epic comeback that rewrites the history books.
The turnaround comes, ironically, with the axis that in Barcelona had negatively affected the final score: Manolas De Rossi, to which is added Edin Dzeko in the modern version number 9. Runs, fights, scores. The extraordinary Champions of Rome, after Atletico Madrid, Chelsea and Shakthar Donetsk, is enriched by the most incredible and unpredictable episode . [/ Vc_column_text] [/ vc_column] [/ vc_row]

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The crazy Olimpico, the tweets of the opposing teams, James Pallotta diving into the fountain in Piazza del Popolo : it looks like a world turned upside down, but Eusebio da Pescara to bring reason back to where it does not seem to exist. “Let’s not be satisfied, we must have the ambition to arrive in Kiev”, with shoes full of pebbles to be emptied in front of those who in recent months had repeatedly dismissed him as a small coach (true D’Alema
) . Even the legendary Roma Dundee 3-0 of 1984 pales in front of Roma Barcelona 2018.
History manuals shattered also at the Santiago Bernabeu.In the history of the Cups only once in 221 had a team been able to overturn a 0-3 home match in the first leg . And in 1959 matches played in Madrid by Real only 24 times, 1.2%, a result was achieved that would have been favorable to the Bianconeri to access the semifinals.
Yet it was not enough because Allegri’s Juve studied the Giallorossi notes from the previous evening by heart, reaching the impossible 30 seconds from the end. It is 0-3 in the Casa Blanca, merengues in dolls plunged back into the same nightmare of the Catalan enemies. Douglas Costa laughs at Marcelo in the carioca duel on the wing, Carvajal and Vallejo dominated by Mandzukic, Matuidi Pjanic and Khedira towering over the median in front of the strongest midfield in the world. Everest to climb which after 61 minutes has become little more than an overpass.

The football mafia lo deja fuera at Juventus.
– Jose Luis Chilavert (@JoseLChilavert_) 11 April 2018
Then the Eupalla of Breriana memoryput things back in order, immortalizing the European stories of Real Madrid and Juventus in the contact Lucas Vazquez – Benatia. United by the same coat of arms in their own borders, they have taken different paths in foreign lands: the former always or almost always hitting glory, thanks to merit, superiority and astral conjunctions that are never adverse. The latter always stopping one step away from triumph, bumping into the various Magath, Riedle, Mijatovic, Schevchenko, Suarez, Cristiano Ronaldo or Michael Oliver, the English referee who shattered the Juventus feat in the 93rd minute by granting a generous penalty that lends itself to multiple interpretations. Photocopy epilogue to last year’s quarter-finals, again at the Bernabeu, again with a home match director, this time Bayern Munich victim.But the anger, understandable, of the Lady must not obscure the all-Italian pride for having overturned the predictions of the eve, like Rome 24 hours before, sanctioning the end of the Spanish domination for clubs . Forty days lived on the edge of emotions in which our home football was rediscovered more human and finally at the height of the European one, even in the stands: the tears without a flag for Astori, the applause of Ronaldo’s reverse stadium, the compliments transversal for the Giallorossi masterpiece . The biggest worry remains a night in mid-November, of a dream turned into a nightmare, of a vanished World Cup. History books to be rewritten also in this case.
Congratulations to @OfficialASRoma for the great victory tonight and the passage to the semifinals of #UCL
– JuventusFC (@juventusfc) April 10, 2018
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