Juventus might have blown their chance to be in the UCL next season after defeat to Sassuolo, but Allegri believes the loss was deserved
Juventus head coach, Massimiliano Allegri has said that his team deserved to lose after a lacklustre performance in their ill-fated Serie A fixture against Sassuolo.
Juventus risk UEFA Champions League future in loss to Sassuolo
The Old Lady were beaten at Sassuolo thanks to a solitary Gregoire Defrel strike after 64 minutes, putting their hopes of reaching the UEFA Champions League qualifying spots despite all odds in jeopardy.
The race for the top four in Serie A in the 2022/23 season has been one of many twists and turns.
Clubs involved have been shockingly poor in their quest for European football next season, allowing Juventus back into the race despite a hefty 15-point deduction imposed on the Turin giants midway through the season as punishment for being found guilty in a capital gains scandal.
What little hope Juventus had of sneaking into the top four this season took a massive blow when the Bianconeri suffered a defeat at Sassuolo, leaving them on 44 points, 13 points behind AC Milan in fourth place with eight games to go.
Allegri believes Juventus deserved to lose after ‘stationary first half’
Speaking after the game against Sassuolo, Juventus' boss Allegri commented on the defeat, saying that his side deserved to lose after making a critical mistake.
“It worries me in the sense that it was an important step today for the championship and afterwards we made a mistake and deserved to lose,” Allegri started before adding, “Now we need to roll up our sleeves, prepare for Thursday’s match against Sporting and roll up our wounds and improve.”
Elaborating on the costly mistake that his team made, Allegri said, “We played in a stationary way in the first half, without moving. They came to get us and they were very good. In the second half it could have been better and we suffered in those initial 5 minutes that cost us the game.”
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Juventus’ next fixture is against Sporting CP in the UEFA Europa League, the club’s last chase to make it to the UEFA Champions League next season and the Bianconeri will need to put the defeat against Sassuolo behind them to be in the best shape for their trip to Portugal.
They hold a slim 1-0 lead from the first leg and will be hoping to capitalise on that in the second leg of the quarterfinal.
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