2013 Italian Super Cup Review. Juventus F.C vs S.S Lazio‏

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Article by e-Football's Serie-A Correspondent Daniel Pisani

An eagerly awaited game was upon us at the Stadio Olimpico for this years edition of the TIM Italian Supercoppa.

The past 2 super cup finals were held in Beijing so this year saw the return of the final on Italian soil but the venue was the topic of discussion seeing as Lazio play their home football in the Stadio Olimpico. So the Coppa Italia champions would be playing at home whilst the Scudetto champions were left wondering why the game was not held at the Juventus Stadium or at the very least a neutral venue such as the San Siro in Milan.

Never the less the game went ahead with all the hype that surrounds a match that has a trophy at the end of it.

Lazio's coach Vladimir Petkovic was adamant that his team did everything right in pre-season to ensure the trophy was theirs at the end of the 90 minutes and Miroslav Klose was hopeful of ending his curse of not being able to beat the Juventus defence.

On the other side of the coin we saw Antonio Conte's men coming off a dreadful preseason with losses to Everton, LA Galaxy and Inter Milan but they were confident of the true side coming out for such a big occasion.

Ahead of the match Juventus found that their training facilities in Rome were not up to standard and were left stranded looking for a pitch to train on ahead of the final. To the rescue came A.S Roma who showed great sportsmanship and put their own rivalry aside to offer the Old Lady their famous training ground at Trigoria. This upset the Roman faithful as they were helping a rival but what would have hurt more? Giving Juventus the luxury of using top facilities or watching your cross town rivals lifting the Super Cup.

The Juventus board then proposed that A.S Roma should they please, use Vinovo (Juventus Training Facility) when they travel to Turin later this year to play against Torino F.C. This reminded me of when Glasgow Rangers offered Juventus their training ground to help them in every way to over come Celtic in the last 16 of the Champions League earlier this year.

Lazio came out of the blocks early in this final with Candreva troubling the Juve flanks but to no avail. It was interesting watching Tevez and Vucinic headlining the Juve attack to see how they would combine and at the early exchanges it was Lazio defender Giuseppe Biava who had the better of the proceedings.

20th minute rolled around and Antonio Conte had to look to his bench when Claudio Marchisio was fouled by Radu which left the Italian midfielder clutching at his knee and was replaced by Juve fan favourite Paul Pogba.

3 minutes later Juve had a free kick about 30 yards out and the master "Magic" Pirlo was over the ball. With Marchetti in goal who is a fantastic shot stopper Pirlo knew his effort needed to be pin point to defeat the Italian number 2 goalie. It was a set move and Pirlo found Lichtsteiner who's pass to the middle was deflected to Pogba who swivelled and his left foot shot found the bottom corner.

The sky blue side from Rome attacked and soon after almost found themselves level after a great build up that saw Hernanes combine with Lulic who found Radu whose left foot thunder bolt was well saved by Gigi Buffon.

At the break we were at 1-0 for the Turin giants and made the viewers wonder if Petkovic was going to chase the game early in the second half by pushing Hernanes or Candreva higher or would Antonio Conte show true Fabio Capello style and shut up shop.

Both sides remained the same and it was Juve who came out with the intention to score and double their advantage. Sure enough 7 minutes after the break on the counter attack Vucinic sprung Lichsteiner free near the half way line and it was an unfamiliar player getting forward in support. It was the #3 nicknamed King Kong, Giorgio Chiellini who initially won the ball back in his own box who supported Lichtsteiner and slotted in the 2nd goal in a true strikers finish.

Two minutes later they were at it again and once more it was a combination between Lichtsteiner and Vucinic which resulted in the Swiss international finding himself one on one with Lazio keeper and calmly slotted the ball passed Marchetti and Juve were on a roll.

Surely tactical changes would come to protect a 3 goal advantage and yes Petkovic made attacking adjustments but Lazio never troubled the Juve defence.

Didn't matter though because again two minutes later it was a well worked combination between Lichsteiner, Vucinic and Pogba that eventually found Juventus new boy Carlos Tevez who slotted in the 4-0 advantage and with that the Italian Super Cup.

The remaining 30 minutes seemed a training run for the black and white whilst Lazio seemed as though they were in a state f shock.

The 57,000 strong crowd kept singing and the atmosphere was great but I will say it is a real shame that Lazio supporters started to "boo" the coloured players of Juventus every time they touched the ball but to their credit Ogbonna, Asamoaha and Pogba kept their cool. Even Lazio's Belgian defender Luis Cavanda was coping stick from his own supporters which is a real shame to see and would not be surprised it the FIGC (Italian Federation) lash out and hand Lazio a fine.

Overall a great spectacle for the new emerging Italian Football, it was good not to see the old shut up shop type of Football which is necessary but in this case a whole heap of goals was perfect for this occasion.

Juventus to be a force again definitely!! Lazio are not that far off as a spell of ten minutes of no concentration cost them, they will surely learn from this and be better for it in the long run.

HIGHLIGHTS