Adu Starts As Monaco Beat Juve On Penalties

Juventus and AS Monaco met at the Stadio San Filippo of Messina for a prestigious friendly as both sides prepare to resume the league season following the winter break.

The Bianconeri played with a team close to their strongest XI, with Amauri, captain Alessandro Del Piero, Pavel Nedved, Nicola Legrottaglie, and Mohamed Sissoko all starting, while Gigi Buffon made his return between the sticks after a lengthy injury-forced absence. Monaco, meanwhile, played with a second-string team full of youngsters. Freddy Adu and Serge Gapke spearheaded the attack in a 4-4-2 formation.

Amauri made himself dangerous for the first time in the 7th minute, when he controlled the ball nicely on the edge of the area and fired a shot, which was well saved by goalkeeper Stéphane Ruffier.

The young stand-in keeper, who was deputizing for Flavio Roma, produced another superb save two minutes later on a dangerous header by Amauri.

It was all Juve at the start of the match, and on the half hour mark Del Piero came close again with a low left-footed shot on an assist by Zdenek Grygera that went just wide of the post.

Against the run of play, it was the French side who took the lead in the 35th minute, when Legrottaglie clearly fouled Adu and a penalty was awarded. Midfielder Jerko Leko took it, and easily worked it past Buffon.

Juve had a final chance in the first half when Del Piero’s precise free kick in the 46th minute was tipped over the bar by Ruffier.

During half-time, coach Claudio Ranieri opted to make no less than nine changes to his side, leaving on only his two central defenders, while Monaco coach Ricardo Gomes only made two changes, bringing in Djamel Bakar for Gapke and Yohann Thuram-Ulien for Ruffier.

In the second half, Monaco looked like they could hold on to their lead, as they mostly sat back to defend, but Juve came close in the 66th minute through substitute Sebastian Giovinco, who fired a cracking shot from distance that hit the post.

Just when it seemed it was all over for the Bianconeri, they grabbed an equaliser at the death when another substitute, Vincenzo Iaquinta, hit a nice first-time shot on a through ball by Cristiano Zanetti that beat Thuram-Ulien.

There was no extra time, and the game was decided on a penalty shoot out after the 90 minutes. The only miss came from Paolo De Ceglie, who saw his shot saved by Thuram-Ulien, so the “Trofeo Cittá di Messina” went to AS Monaco.

Starting XIs:

Juventus: Buffon; Grygera, Ariaudo, Legrottaglie, Molinaro; Marchionni, Sissoko, Marchisio, Nedved; Del Piero, Amauri.

Monaco: Ruffier; Modesto, Mongongu, Adriano, Mangani; Sagbo, Leko, Pokrivac, Diaz; Adu, Gapke.

--Danilo Pochini, Goal.com