Currently Juventus sit atop the table in Serie A, looking to win their fourth consecutive domestic title. Through ten league matches, Juve are in their familiar position in first place with 25 points, three clear of second-place Roma. The play of Carlos Tevez in his second season with the Italian giants has been a key factor to their early success, and keeping him in top form will go a long way to clinching that fourth straight title.
All hasn’t been perfect for Juventus this season, but the veteran presence of Tevez and others has helped the side overcome a number of struggles to remain overwhelming favorites (11/20) to win Serie A according to Gambling.com partner sites. The most recent pitfall suffered by the team came in a last-second loss to Genoa, which was the third loss in six games for Juventus at that point in the season.
That loss coupled with a Champions League defeat at the hands of Greek side Olympiakos a week earlier led to much hand-wringing around the job coach Max Allegri was doing running the Italian powerhouse. That is the atmosphere Tevez and his teammates were working under coming into this weekend’s match with Empoli, a match in which they responded in emphatic fashion.
Juventus came away from the Empoli match with a 2-0 victory that included goals from Andrea Pirlo and Alvaro Morata, the latter coming off an assist from Tevez. That assist was the Argentine’s fourth of the season, good for third in the league. He is also tied for second in goals scored in Serie A with six. Both assist and goal totals lead the team and have gone a long way towards weathering the recent storm.
Now the attention must turn the the Champions League, a competition where Juve has suffered recent 1-0 losses to Atletico Madrid and the aforementioned Olympiakos, only defeating Malmo so far in the campaign. That record has them third in Group A, three points behind the Greek and Spanish co-leaders. A victory today to start the second leg of the group stage would go a long way to re-establishing Juventus as a threat in Europe and hopefully establish momentum when they return to domestic play.
In both competitions, the play of Tevez will be crucial to his side’s success. Thus far he has proven to be more than up to the challenge, and Juve supporters can take solace in the fact that his form shows no signs of decline.