Juventus 2 - Fiorentina 4: Initial reaction and random observations

It started with a thoroughly deserved two-goal lead in the first half of an important game on the road. The ball started rolling with the inability to stretch a 2-0 halftime lead into anything more than that. It continued when Giuseppe Rossi converted from the penalty spot to cut Juventus' lead in half.

And then, in what seemed like in a blink of an eye, it turned into an absolute shit show.

A game that was looking so good turned into something horror movies are based off of in a 15-minute span. No, really. Fiorentina scored all four of their goals between the 65th and 80th minutes. Juventus not only got hit on the counter by Fiorentina, they got hit in the face like in a heavyweight fight and had nothing to answer it.

They were shocked, and it was their own doing.

We can credit the effort Fiorentina all we want, but this isn't about that. This is about what's wrong with Juventus, what looked to be fixed for 60-plus minutes and then suddenly decided to suck us into some kind of sick joke. They didn't put Fiorentina away. They let them hang around and Fiorentina took full advantage of it. For whatever reason, they went from essentially killing off Fiorentina in the first half to getting killed themselves in the span of 15 or 20 minutes.

If Juventus score a third on one of their very good chances early in the second half, the game could very well have beenover and done with. they're heading back to Turin riding high with three points in their pockets and we're singing their praises rather than throwing things through the window. Oh what could have been.

I just don't get it. The Juventus defense looked so good for 60-plus minutes. It was like they were on cruise control. The stupid mistakes that had haunted Juve for so many games before the international break were gone. Everything was looking great. Viola fans were essentially conceding the game.

Then all that happened.

Juventus were up 2-0 in the 65th minute. I don't know what else to say.

Conte: We’ve lost a game that we dominated for 70 minutes. We were seemingly home and dry and had several chances to score a third.

— JuventusFC (@juventusfcen) October 20, 2013

Bingo.

Random thoughts and observations

• Remember when Juventus were up 2-0 and the defense was playing great?
  
  
• When your team goes down two goals, the answer to all your problems is to throw Marco Motta onto the field. That should do it, right? Amazing, absolutely amazing.
  
  
• Leonardo Bonucci screwed up on the game-tying goal, sure, but so did Gigi Buffon. Not exactly a straight shot right at him, but how many times do we see him save that, 99 out of 100? Turns out the one time he didn't, it opened the floodgates.
  
  
• Remember when I said Juventus had to contain Rossi to be successful? Yeah, about that...
  
  
• I've already seen a lot of "This is the wakeup call Juventus needs" posts on this here internet. Do I think it can help? Sure, I'm an optimistic guy. But we also thought the international break would help Antonio Conte figure out some things and look how that turned out. The best thing to happen is that there's a game in three days on one of the biggest stages there is. Flush it and get ready for Real Madrid. And stop making stupid defensive mistakes. That'd be nice.
  
  
• Fernando Llorente had a pretty solid game until everything went to hell. There's something positive.
  
  
• Before we write off the entire season, let's remember one thing: It's Oct. 20 and Juve still have 30 games left in Serie A. There's a pretty favorable schedule coming post-Real Madrid. Not sayin', but I guess I'm just sayin'.
  
  
• Juventus were up 2-0 in the 65th minute. I still don't get it.