23 April 2016
The mathematics make it clear. Juventus need four more points to claim an historic fifth consecutive league title regardless of Napoli’s results in their remaining fixtures.
Heading into this latest round of weekend action, Massimiliano Allegri urged his players to claim a win which would put them on the brink of sewing up the Scudetto, whilst acknowledging that they would need to be at their very best in order to overcome fifth-placed Fiorentina on Sunday evening.
“We’ve not won anything just yet and we go to Florence looking to bring all three points back to Turin. Of course we know that it won’t be easy. The Viola have all but qualified for the Europa League and they’ll be especially pumped up for tomorrow.
“We can expect a very tough and intense tussle against Fiorentina, who are the side to have scored the most amount of goals in the opening half-hour of games this season in Serie A.”
Turning his attentions to the subject of squad selection for Sunday’s showdown at the Stadio Artemio Franchi, Allegri ruled out the availability of Giorgio Chiellini whilst revealing that he had some decisions to make later today regarding several other players.
“Chiellini is in good shape but I won’t be taking any risks on rushing him back into action tomorrow. After today’s training session I’ll evaluate whether (Simone) Zaza, (Alvaro) Morata, (Mario) Lemina and (Kwadwo) Asamoah will play.
“Likewise, I’ll make a call later on (Sami) Khedira. While it’s true that he is yet to feature in three games back to back this term, he didn’t play all of the previous two against Palermo and Lazio. I’ll see whether he’s in a position to start in Florence.”
Wrapping up his press conference, Allegri insisted that it was important to look at the bigger picture of the current campaign, with a Coppa Italia final against Milan pencilled in on 21 May, whilst not losing sight of next season’s aspirations, among which continued improvement in the Champions League looms large.
“We need to make sure that we’re all in fine shape both physically and mentally for our cup final next month. We’re looking good at present, but we can’t afford to let our intensity drop off at all over this period.
“As regards the next campaign, we need to work hard to maintain our leading position in Italy, but it’s especially important that we perform strongly again in Europe. Each one of us needs to keep demanding more from himself all the time in order to continue growing and developing.”
