Juventus crush Cremonese to start second half of Serie A season

“How long has it been?”

That’s the question I started asking myself as the time ticked away in the latter stages of Juventus’ lopsided 5-0 victory over Cremonese on Monday night. How long has it been since the Bianconeri had laid an epic beating like this on another team in Serie A? Juve had had solid victories, even games were they genuinely dominated, like last week’s win over Sassuolo and (sans the result) the game before against Lecce. But how long had it been since the Old Lady of Italian football had laineth the smackdown like this on a foe in a league game?

As it turns out, the answer is February 2018. That’s the last time Juve scored five goals or more goals in a Serie A game, when they keelhauled Sassuolo 7-0 behind a Sami Khedria hat trick.

Given the fact that the team’s general tendency in the last five or six years has been to play down to opponents like Cremonese, Monday was an incredibly welcome change. With the small exception of another near-disastrous pass by Andrea Cambiaso, it never looked for a moment like the Grigiorossi were in any way shape or form in a position to make noise in this game. Juve were up 2-0 within 15 minutes and 3-0 within 35, before finishing their opponents off with aplomb by the hour mark. And they could’ve had even more continuing to pour forward for even more to the very end of the match. It was Luciano Spalletti’s master class at the club — so far.

It also took advantage of a bunch of results from earlier in the weekend, when AC Milan, Inter, Napoli, and Bologna all dropped points. They came out of the day jumping ahead of both Roma and Napoli into third on goal difference, only a point behind Milan and four behind Inter — albeit both Milan clubs and Napoli still have games in hand to make up after the Supercoppa. Despite that, Juve have never been more firmly entrenched in the race for the top four, and it could only take a couple of slip-ups by the teams at the top to have the Bianconeri improbably launch themselves back into the title race.

Spalletti was still dealing with the absence of Federico Gatti, Daniele Rugani, Dusan Vlahovic, Francisco Conceição, and Arkadiusz Milik. He decided to retain the 3-4-2-1 formation as opposed to reverting to his experiment with a four-man defense two games ago. Michele Di Gregorio started in goal, screened by Pierre Kalulu, Bremer, and Lloyd Kelly. Weston McKennie and Cambiaso served as wing-backs, flanking the midfield of Manuel Locatelli and Khéphren Thuram. Fabio Miretti remained in the trequartista spot alongside Kenan Yildiz, both supporting Jonathan David in the attack.

Davide Nicola’s side had given Juve fits in Cremona in November, only falling 2-1 after a grandstand finish. He hoped to do the same in Turin, hoping to shake off a midweek collapse against Genoa that saw them blow a 2-0 lead. Martin Payero was out due to illness, but other than that Nicola had a full squad with which to man his 3-5-2. Juve academy grad Emil Audero stood in goal, behind the back three of Filippo Terraciano, Federico Baschirotto, and Matteo Bianchetti. Alessio Zerbin and Giuseppe Pezzella were the wing-backs, sandwiching the trio of Warren Bondo, Alberto Grassi, and Dennis Johnsen in the middle of the park. Jamie Vardy, just a day after his 39th birthday, led the line alongside Federico Bonazzoli.

Things got started early, with Thuram firing on goal just six minutes in. Seconds later David jumped on a terrible back pass by Johnsen and, just like against Sassuolo, charged toward goal. This time Audero was able to string him out just a little to narrow his angle, but he still slammed the ball off the post. Just a few minutes later Cambiaso very nearly saw another pass in his own defensive third turn into a disaster. He tried to chest a cross down for Di Gregorio, not sensing the presence of Zerbin right behind him, who was almost able to ghost past him and latch onto the ball, but the keeper was alert and threw his hands in front of Zerbin’s shot.

But the game quickly turned in the home team’s favor.

Three minutes after the near-calamity, Juve lined up for a free kick from the left wing. The ball was headed out, and Miretti set up underneath it and hit a thunderous volley. The shot was probably going wide, but fortune was with the Old Lady on this night. The ball slammed into Bremer’s face, taking a massive deflection that left Audero no chance to recover as it flew into the net and giving off distinct vibes of Dani Rojas shouting “My face scored a goal!”

Juve’s second strike was far more intentional. Locatelli made a fantastic pass to trigger a fast counterattack, and Thuram bombed down the middle of the field. He had options on either side, but slipped David through on his left. The striker took a touch in stride and rifled the ball over Audero’s leg and into the net for Juve’s second goal in three minutes.

Ten minutes later, the visitors thought they had a route back into the game. Johnsen collected a ball from Terraciano and tried to settle it as McKennie and Locatelli closed in. Locatelli went for one of his patented slide tackles, but it wasn’t as clean as they usually are, and when Johnsen went down referee Ermano Feliciani pointed to the spot relatively quickly. Cremonese were arguing for more, saying that Locatelli had put his studs into the Norwegian’s thigh and appealing for a red card. When Feliciani went to the VAR monitor and viewed the play, most thought he was indeed checking whether to send Juve’s captain off, but the replay also showed one thing rather clearly: Locatelli had won the ball before making any contact with Johnsen. Feliciani returned to the field and announced that no foul had occurred, sending Cremonese into a frenzy of anger that resulted in the dismissal of Nicola from the sideline.

That anger saw a brief spurt of energy where Cremonese managed to sustain an attack, but they were destined to be even more frustrated just after the half-hour. Miretti had charged through the middle on the counter this time. He found David ahead of him, who used his first touch to cushion the ball beautifully into the path of Thuram. His shot was blocked by a lunging Baschirotto, but the ball deflected off of his arm, which he was holding in an unnatural position well above his head. Feliciani quickly called the handball, and this time VAR official Matteo Gariglio didn’t intervene. Yildiz stepped to the spot, and at first it looked like Juve’s luck had run out when Audero guessed right and fingertipped the ball onto the post, but the ball bounced right back to the young Turk, who calmly clipped it back into the goal to put Juve up 3-0.

Yildiz had a few more looks at goal before the break, bringing a save out of Audero and forcing a block a few minutes later. Juve went right back to the grindstone coming out of the locker rooms, and in less than three minutes the game went beyond any doubt whatsoever when Miretti sent McKennie into the box with an exquisite pass with the outside of his foot. The US international’s technique was a bit clunky, but he still managed to round Audero and roll the ball toward the goal. Bianchetti tried desperately to clear it off the line, but Terraciano had already slid in for it and Bianchetti’s attempt bounced off him and back into the goal.

Yildiz tested Audero again in the 54th minute, and another 10 minutes later the cherry was placed atop the sundae. Miretti was again involved, receiving a pass from Locatelli and turning it into the path of Kalulu, who put up a gorgeous cross that found McKennie at the penalty spot, and this time there could be no question as to the goal’s provenance as he guided a neat header into the bottom corner past Audero’s hand.

Di Gregorio had to be ready to keep his clean sheet in the 72nd minute when Grassi fired a 13-yard snap shot that the keeper dove to palm away with one hand. Juve, meanwhile kept pushing until the very end. David was denied a brace by the offside flag, and then by Audero. But both teams were simply seeing out the minutes by the end, and when Feliciani blew his whistle after minimal stoppage time Juve had their biggest margin of victory in years in the bag—and reeled in the leaders just a little bit.