Juventus manager Andrea Pirlo has refused to hand out too much praise following the impressive defeat of Dynamo Kiev last night.

The coach set his side up well to earn a 3-0 victory in Turin last night, keeping Juve in touching distance of top spot.

The Old Lady will need to beat Barcelona by a better scoreline than the 2-0 they received in Italy, when Alvaro Morata had a hat-trick of offside goals ruled out.

While he has praised the performances in recent weeks, only for that form to fall apart when returning to action domestically the following weekend, Pirlo appears to have taken a more cautious approach last night, by simply saying he was ‘satisfied’.

“I am satisfied with the guys’ approach, who managed the result well,” Pirlo said after the result (as translated by Juve’s official website). “You can’t always have the ball and so it happens that you have to defend for a few minutes. We needed to play as a team and give a positive signal to ourselves.

“Morata? We know him well, he arrived at Juve very young and had an important growth path from the mental aspect. He is happy to be part of this group, we wanted him at all costs and we are happy to have him with us.

“Chiesa’s goal? I’m happy for Federico, he needed to score and he was good.

“The match against Barcelona is one of those matches that prepare themselves. It won’t be easy, but we will go there to play our football. But let’s not forget that before we have the Derby and now we have to concentrate on that.”

We have been able to continue to impress in Europe, despite struggling to string together back-to-back wins in the league, and a more cautious approach may well have been needed.

We look to the derby on the weekend, before travelling to Barcelona in hope of snatching top spot, which could well prove crucial to our hopes of Champions League glory.

Patrick