An early red card sealed Torino’s fate as Juve ran rampant with goals from Paulo Dybala, Miralem Pjanic and Alex Sandro to secure a 4-0 victory against their city rivals.
Player Ratings
Gigi Buffon: A spectator – With the home side down to 10 men, Gigio had next to nothing to do for the vast majority of the game. 5.0/10
Stephan Lichtsteiner: A live wire down the right, offering plenty of attacking intent. His passing and movement was impressive tonight and he was sharp at the back as well. 6.5/10
Giorgio Chiellini: Did a good job of keeping Belotti quiet early on and his job was made all the easier by the Torino red card. Made some good forays into the opponents half, and didn’t put a foot wrong in defence. 6.5/10
Medhi Benatia: Very good in defence, hunting down every ball, marking Belotti as closely as possible. Good range of passing out from the back, had a great chance to score a fourth goal. Impressive. 6.5/10
Alex Sandro: Excellent at the start, providing great overlapping runs with Alex Sandro – Brilliant effort early in the second half to add a third goal with a shot from distance before finally scoring with a bullet header. Back to his best. 6.5/10
Juan Cuadrado: Still lacking in the end product at times, some poorly placed passes but he played his part in the win, providing the assist for the second Juve goal. 6.5/10
Miralem Pjanic: Sublime display, pinging passes all across the pitch – Provided the assist for Juve’s opener before scoring Juve’s second with a perfectly placed finish and then delivering the corner for Alex Sandro’s header. Majestic. 7.5/10
Blaise Matuidi: Another game, another great showing in midfield, breaking up the Torino attacks, pushing forward and working to great effect with Pjanic and Costa. Industrious. 6.5/10
Paulo Dybala: A brilliant display – Ran all over the attacking third of the pitch, drifting out to the left, playing great 1-2’s with his teammates before opening the scoring with a perfectly taken goal from distance. Scored the 4th Juve goal with a neatly taken effort to beat Sirigu late in the match. A joy to watch. 8.0/10
Mario Mandzukic: Despite not scoring, the big Croat was at the heart of everything good in attack. Held up play well, touched the ball off for his teammates and should have scored a goal of his own. A constant presence in the Torino box, he made the space for Dybala and the wingers to operate in. 7.0/10
Douglas Costa: A much improved showing on the wing to start with, twisting and turning his marker to get into the box. Lovely runs and step-overs to bamboozle the Toro defenders. Excellent deliveries. A good performance all round. 6.5/10
Substitutes
Rodrigo Bentancur: Came on late into the match with the result secured. . N/A
Federico Bernardeschi: Had 30 minutes to make an impact and had 2 great opportunities to score a goal of his own. Another good cameo, should be starting a game soon. 6.0/10
Gonzalo Higuain: Subbed on with 10 mins left to keep the Juve attack looking fresh. N/A
Manadzukic was brilliant, i fucking love Paulo Dybala and more Bernardeschi please. This will be a dangerous trio.
Perfect game. I was expecting a tight affair, but i believe Mandzukic made a huge difference up top aside from Dybala. Incredibly unpredictable and class first touch with all legal body parts.
Everything is falling into place. Hoping the team continues to solidify.
Next season a central defender, unless Hoewedes becomes a regular starter, and a right back who can take on defenders is needed. Imagine we had Bonucci and a player close to Marcelo or Sandro in quality – we would be one of the 2-3 favorites to win CL. Now we are probably a dark horse. A top 4-6 team. Matuidi and Pjanic are my picks for central midfield in the big matches with Costa and Cuadrado in the flanks. Maybe even Mandzukic before Higauin if he doesn’t get more fit.
Caldara will come back from Atalanta and Lirola from Sassuolo.