With the first game of March now here, Juventus manager Max Allegri chose an interesting way to describe the new month as well as the final stretch of the 2023-24 season quickly approaching during his pre-match press conference on Saturday.
“The most beautiful period of the season,” is how Allegri started to describe the period of time that is about to begin with tonight’s trip to Naples to face defending Serie A champions yet very much out of the top four Napoli.
“... but also the most complicated.”
Ah, well damn.
You had me going there for a second. Considering how February went for Juventus, I was really looking forward to beautiful things as compared to, well, the February that Juventus just had.
A trip to Naples is complicated no matter the form this current Napoli side may be in. They obviously aren’t dismantling teams — including Juventus — left and right like they did a year ago under Luciano Spalletti, but a lot of the same characters from last season’s Cinderella story are still there to try and beat the Bianconeri tonight.
For all we know, this could be the good start to the beautiful period to close the season that Allegri hopes it will be. Or, it could get even more complicated and that distance between second and fifth could continue to shrink because Juventus’ February form carries into March.
I know which one I want to see happen. Surely it’s the same as you. Let’s hope that Door No. 2 is not really an option no matter how much of a tough task the rest of Juve’s schedule looks to be.
MATCH INFO
When: Sunday, March 3, 2024.
Where: Stadio Diego Armando Maradona, Naples, Italy.
Official kickoff time: 8:45 p.m. in Italy and the Central European time zone, 7:45.m. in the United Kingdom, 2:45 p.m. Eastern time, 11:45 a.m. Pacific time.
STARTING LINEUPS
Juventus starting XI (3-5-2): Szczesny; Rugani, Bremer, Alex Sandro; Cambiaso, Miretti, Locatelli, Alcaraz, Iling-Junior; Vlahovic, Chiesa.
Juventus bench: Pinsoglio, Daffara, Gatti, Danilo, Kostić, Milik, Yildiz, Weah, Djaló, Nicolussi Caviglia, Nonge.
Napoli starting XI (4-3-3): Meret; Di Lorenzo, Rrahmani, Juan Jesus, Olivera; Anguissa, Lobotka, Traore; Politano, Osimhen, Kvaratskhelia.
HOW TO WATCH
Television: TLN (Canada); TNT Sports 1 (United Kingdom).
Online/Streaming: Paramount+ (United States); fuboTV Canada (Canada); discovery+, discovery+ app (United Kingdom); DAZN Italy, Sky Go Italia (Italy).
Other live viewing options can be found here, and as always, you can also follow along with us live and all the stupid things we say on Twitter. If you haven’t already, join the community on Black & White & Read All Over, and join in the discussion below.