La Vecchia Signora and it's fall from grace: Part1
In 1897, a few students from Massimo D’Azeglio Lyceum formed a football club in Turin and named it Foot-Ball Club Juventus. At that time, pink and black were the colors of Juventus, but after taking inspiration from the English side, Notts County, black
and white became the Turin culture and they proclaimed themselves as ‘I Bianconeri’.
Not many people could have predicted that this club would go on to become one of the most successful clubs in the history of Italian football. It was 1923 when Edoardo Agnelli, who owned the motor company, Fiat, bought the club and built a new stadium. Signor
Agnelli had a dream that he would take the club to a whole new level and after his death, the next of his kin will take the reins and it will carry on.
The club fulfilled Agnelli’s dream and went on to dominate Italian football from 1923 till the mid 80s. Europe turned out to be great hunting ground for Juventus, as the side went on to win 4 European titles.
In 2004, the decline of Juventus began. In May, 2006, after winning two successive Scudetti under http://www.senore.com/Football-soccer/Fabio-c13152 Capello, Juventus were linked along with 5 clubs to the infamous “Calciopoli scandal”, and were relegated for the first time in their history to the Serie
B.
It was great news for Juventus when http://www.senore.com/Football-soccer/Big-Players-c38635 like Del Piero, Buffon and Pavel Nedved chose to stay at Turin and helped the side tremendously in the very next season. After finishing 3rd in Serie A during the 2007-08 Season, it was widely thought
that Juventus will once again carry on from where they left, and the signs were good. In the Champions League, Juventus beat the mighty Real Madrid in both legs, but were later knocked out by http://www.senore.com/Football-soccer/Chelsea-c38786. The major fall started as they were knocked out of the
Copa Italia, and by the end of January 2010, Juventus were lying in sixth place in Serie A. http://www.senore.com/Football-soccer/Alberto-c4309 Zaccheroni was brought on to replace Ciro Ferrara, but he couldn’t do much in changing the Old Lady’s fortunes and Juventus finished the season in 7th
place without any trophy in the cabinet.
The Agnelli family had had enough and, for this season, Jean-Claude Blanc was replaced as the great grandson of Edoardo Agnelli, Andrea Agnelli, took over as club president. His first move was to sack Zaccheroni and replace him with Luigi Del Neri, who had
a great season with Sampdoria. It was widely acknowledged that Del Neri was the right man to lead Juventus to better days.
A lot of euphoria surrounded Turin at the start of the current season and even the most pessimistic Juventus could smell silver. Juventus made a great start to the season and even prompted former Juventus players to believe that they could lift the Scudetto
when they beat A.C Milan on their own soil.
But, perhaps the pressure and hype was too much for the players and they started regressing every other game. After getting knocked out in the group stages of the Europa League, Juventus were expected to mount a serious title assault, but it never happened.
The last two games have shown how much Juventus have changed. Two consecutive defeats- against Parma and then http://www.senore.com/Football-soccer/Napoli-c40003- with 7 goals conceded have literally ruined Juventus’ chances of winning the league.
The away games to Napoli and Parma were supposed to be tough, but a rout was not in the cards at all. A 4-0 humiliation followed by a 3-0 whipping isn’t the sign of a team that’s aiming for a Scudetto. Those two heavy defeats have ensured that Juventus won’t
be lifting the Scudetto this time.
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