Juventus vs. Sampdoria match preview: Time, TV schedule, and how to watch the Serie A

This little adventure that we started all the way back with preseason training in the heat of mid-July is now within hours of reaching its end conclusion. Then again, we’ve known that Juventus’ fate has been settled for weeks now, with the eighth straight Scudetto clinched last month and then hoisted over Giorgio Chiellini’s head last weekend amongst the rain and confetti of Allianz Stadium.

The final step is one that, on paper, provides little drama for both parties involved — a relative change for Juventus’ opposition over the past month or so with Champions League football seemingly attached to how many points are earned that day.

This weekend, however, it’s all about the final stop on the five-year journey we’ve taken alongside Max Allegri, Juventus’ incredibly accomplished manager who will be departing the club following the completion of the season.

Because I am full of nostalgia during times like these, I decided to go back and look at the post I wrote up after Juventus officially hired Allegri on July 16, 2014. Not only was I reminded of the amusing photo choice that Juve decided to use in their announcement on Twitter and other social media platforms, but I was reminded of the final line of the post that was obviously anything but a full endorsement of who Andrea Agnelli just hired.

Yeah, not exactly exciting news — especially considering the man he’s replacing.

Here’s to the future, Max. Don’t screw it up.

OK, so it’s not like Max’s approval rating was all that high on the day he was hired.

But, as I’ve also written over the years, Allegri shut me up with the best way he knows — winning, winning and winning some more.

Of course, it wasn’t always easy or glamorous along the way — especially this season. And, ultimately, that plays a big part in why Allegri and Agnelli decided that the end of this season was the best time to go their separate ways. The end of Allegri’s cycle at Juventus is over — at least it will be come the end of the weekend when Juventus officially doesn’t have any more games to play and the managerial rumors will surely become more frequent than they already are.

For one more game, Allegri will be the one filling out the starting lineup and barking orders to his players on the sidelines. Just one more day. Like, love him or somewhere not even close to that, this is Max Allegri’s final bow as Juventus manager, a day that some saw coming and one that we’ve officially known is coming for a little over a week now.

What started at the Bentegodi in Verona will come to an end against Sampdoria at the Luigi Ferraris. What a long, strange trip it’s been over the last five years, Max. And, although I wasn’t necessarily a fan of you at first, I’m glad you’ve been a major part of it.

GOOD NEWS

After this weekend, it will be nothing but managerial and transfer rumors for the next three months! Aren’t you all excited?!

BAD NEWS

After this weekend, it will be nothing but managerial and transfer rumors for the next three months! Aren’t you all excited?!

WHAT TO WATCH FOR

1) Celebrating Fabio Quagliarella

Barring some kind of major global emergency or Cristiano Ronaldo coming out of nowhere since he’s not even called up for the season finale and scoring five or six goals, everybody’s favorite tan, chin cleft and handsome former Juventus striker will cruise his way to the Serie A scoring title this season.

Quagliarella is the — insert massive cliché here, folks — walking definition of a player again like a fine Italian wine. At 36 years old, he’s about to be this season’s capocannoniere, leading the league with 26 goals. He has had arguably the best year of his career just when most players either are already retired or are thinking when retirement is going to arrive.

Not Quags.

The race to be Serie A’s leading scorer was a four-man battle not too long ago, with Ronaldo, Atalanta’s Duvan Zapata and Milan’s Krzysztof Piatek all within a goal or two of one another as we went into the second half of the season.

But leave it to Mr. Playstation Goal himself to come up biggest as others have behind. Quagliarella has five goals in his last six games, jumping far enough ahead of the pack where he could go scoreless this weekend against Juventus and the chances of him finishing as Serie A’s top goal scorer would still be the same.

As much as I don’t want to see Juventus give goals regardless of what’s riding on the game, it would be pretty awesome to witness Quagliarella score one more time, in front of the hometown crowd and put one final stamp on one hell of a 2018-19 season.

2) Will we get one last chance to make some Moise?

On Saturday, we had a report that Juventus’ best young prospect in YEARS has agreed to a new five-year contract — make or 10 or 15 if you want, dammit — worth about €2 million a season. That was good.

And then Max Allegri got up on the podium and announced that Moise Kean was going to be in the starting lineup for Juventus’ season finale against Genoa. That was also good.

So, Moise, spotlight’s on you.

The second half of the season has been a breakout of sorts for the 19-year-old Kean. And I call it “a breakout” simply because you look at how many minutes he got in the first half of the season and the compare it to the last four or five months and its night and day. Every single one of Kean’s goals have been scored from the middle of January onward, and he has most certainly benefited from the wide array of Juve’s injuries up front and the simple fact that he has been one of the squad’s more dangerous players when he’s on the field.

Kinda along the same lines as with Quagliarella, seeing Kean score on Sunday would be a nice little capper to a very, very productive — and important — four-month stretch for Juventus’ bright young star striker. And hey, who wouldn’t want an excuse to dance again?

3) A fond farewell to Max

Who knows what to expect from Juventus on Sunday seeing as it is, once again, far from something that any of us would call a full-strength kind of squad. I mean, there are as many forwards as there are goalkeepers available for selection — one of those keepers being Wojciech Szczesny, who apparently has a knee injury that needs to possibly be operated on.

So, basically, it’s pretty easy for Max to name his starting lineup right off the bat.

And that’s what he did at his final pre-match press conference as Juventus manager on Saturday afternoon.

There you have it. You don’t have to wait until there’s an hour before kickoff to log on to this here website, open up the game thread for the first time all day and scroll down to the starting lineup section. The only thing that Allegri did point out was that if Leonardo Spinazzola is deemed good enough to start, then he will get the start on the left wing instead of Pereira.

Other than that, 10 out of the 11 spots are good to go.

Like the past month, the result doesn’t matter. That was the case last weekend when Allegri said his goodbye to the Allianz Stadium faithful against Atalanta. The main thing, as it has been since clinching an eighth straight Scudetto against Fiorentina last month, has basically seeing how much Juventus actually put forward against the day’s opposition.

Maybe Allegri’s final game as Juve’s manager will be the thing that has this team come out with a little extra behind them.

At the very least, it will be a day where Allegri gets a couple of hugs from his players and fellow coaches simply because of what he’s done at the club the past five seasons.

That sure would be nice. Max deserves it.

Photo by Tullio M. Puglia/Getty Images

MATCH INFO

When: Sunday, April 26, 2019

Where: Stadio Luigi Ferraris, Genoa, Italy

Official kickoff time: 8:30 p.m. local time in Italy and across Europe; 7:30 p.m. in the United Kingdom; 2:30 p.m. Eastern Time; 11:30 a.m. Pacific Time

HOW TO WATCH

Television: RAI Italia America (United States); RAI Italia America, TLN (Canada); Premier Sports 1 (United Kingdom)

Online/mobile: ESPN+ (United States); DAZN (Canada); DAZN (Italy)

Other live viewing options can be found here, and as always, you can also follow along with us live and all the stupid things we say on Twitter. If you haven’t already, join the community on Black & White & Read All Over, and join in the discussion below.