31 May 2022
The Italy national team returns to Wembley to face Argentina on Wednesday as the reigning European champion take on the winners of the Copa America. It is inevitable to think of the four Juventus players (Giorgio Chiellini, Leonardo Bonucci, Federico Chiesa and Federico Bernardeschi) plus Manuel Locatelli (signed just after the tournament) and their contribution to the memorable feat in that stadium last summer. Also at Wembley in 1973 - before the makeover that modernised the home of English football - Italy with four Bianconeri players on the field won an unforgettable friendly.
PIVOTAL PROTAGONISTS
14 November 1973. Italy conquered Wembley, having already in the same year at the Comunale in Turin broken the taboo by defeating for the first time those who still consider themselves, as inventors of the game, the masters of football. Two of the four Juventus players on the field that day played a pivotal part in the success: Dino Zoff and Fabio Capello.
FOUR MINUTES FROM TIME
Fabio Capello emerged as the match winner. The decisive action came four minutes from full time. In one of the rare Italian counterattacks, the Lazio legend Giorgio Chinaglia delivered a wicked cross into the middle of the area, which Peter Shilton failed to hold. The ball dropped to the Juventus playmaker, who coolly slotted the ball into the net and propelled Italy to a victory that possessed huge symbolic value.
ZOFF'S RECORD
It was anything but a night off for Zoff that evening at Wembley. Wave after wave of England attacks crashed against the Azzurri's defensive wall, which saw Bianconeri's Luciano Spinosi play right full-back (in the photo the two at a training session at the Combi). Thanks to his clean sheet in London, Dino also set a new record of 917 minutes without conceding a goal for the national side. That same year in Serie A, Zoff would do the same in the shirt of Juventus.
THE DRAGON
The fourth Juventus player on the Wembley turf was Franco Causio. His performance was rated worthy of a score of 7 by one of his great admirers, Giglio Panza. The noted journalist at sports daily Tuttosport wrote that Causio produced "an excellent performance, a demonstration of maturity", adding that "technically Causio is a dragon but we were aware of this before today."
