Game Time Thread: Juventus vs. Sassuolo

Ah, the Mapei Stadium. Sometimes it’s fun to go there, other times it turns out to be a total pain in the ass. We’ve seen the best and worst of Juventus at Sassuolo’s home stadium over the last couple of seasons — and that’s not an overstatement.

As lunchtime in Italy arrives, we get to see which side of Juventus will show.

It’s an early Sunday for Max Allegri and his squad (and for those of us like yours truly who live on the west side of the United States). Lunchtime is also game time, and now we get to see just exactly they will rebound from Tuesday night’s disappointing Champions League group stage opener against Barcelona in Spain.

They could win and play well — which is something I’m sure a lot of us would like to see take place.

They could win and play like buckets full of meh — which is something I’m sure wouldn’t exactly have a lot of people singing Allegri’s praises.

Or they could do what they’ve done a few times over the last few years — which wouldn’t be all that great at all.

So let us sit back and see what Juventus can do during this lunchtime affair where they will be facing a Sassuolo team that has yet to score a goal in their first three Serie A games. That figure suggests that things could be interesting knowing how Juve’s defense has been sometimes good, sometimes bad so far this season.

But hey, at least Juventus have been successful in pretty much all of their previous dozen lunchtime games. It may not be lunchtime everywhere, though, so let’s all just hope that Juventus keep this little trend going...

Do that again, please, Juventus. I ain’t staying up in the middle of the night to see you do a whole lot of nothing today.

MATCH INFO

Location: Stadio Città del Tricolore, Reggio Emilia, Italy

Kick-off time: 12:30 p.m. local time in Spain; 11:30 a.m. in the United Kingdom; 6:30 a.m. on the East Coast; 3:30 a.m. on the West Coast

STARTING LINEUPS

Juventus starting XI (4-2-3-1): Buffon; Lichtsteiner, Rugani, Chiellini, Alex Sandro; Pjanic, Matuidi; Cuadrado, Dybala, Mandzukic; Higuain

Juventus bench: Szczesny, Pinsoglio, Barzagli, Benatia, Asamoah, Bentancur, Sturaro, Douglas Costa, Bernardeschi

Sassuolo starting XI (3-5-2): Consigli; Letschert, Cannavaro, Acerbi; Lirola, Sensi, Magnanelli, Mazzitelli, Adjapong; Politano, Falcinelli

Sassuolo bench: Pegolo, Missiroli, Biondini, Matri, Peluso, Scamacca, Gazzola, Goldaniga, Rogerio, Cassata, Duncan, Ragusa

WATCH IT

TV: beIN Sports USA, beIN Sports en Español, RAI Italia America (United States); ,beIN Sports Canada, beIN SPORTS en Español, Rai Italia America (Canada); BT Sport 3 (United Kingdom); Sky Supercalcio HD, Sky Calcio 1, PremiumSport HD

Online/Mobile: beIN SPORTS CONNECT USA, fuboTV (United States); beIN SPORTS CONNECT Canada, DAZN Canada, fuboTV Canada (Canada); SKY Go Italia (Italy)

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