Game Time Thread: Juventus vs. Barcelona

And the biggest game of the young season is officially upon us all.

That might make some folks around here uneasy. That might make a lot of opposing fans uneasy. Maybe we’re all just uneasy knowing that it’s the Champions League and our respective favorite teams haven’t looked all that great the last few weeks and they’re both missing some important players. Maybe it’s because the Champions League hasn’t been all that kind to either of us in recent years.

And yet, it’s a big game.

It’s a very big game between two very big clubs.

Juventus hosts Barcelona tonight in the first big, big game of the 2020-21 season. There will be no Cristiano Ronaldo or Giorgio Chiellini. There will be no Gerard Pique. There will be Lionel Messi and Paulo Dybala, so that’s something to look forward to. Same goes for seeing Dejan Kulusevski and Ansu Fati. You might not get Ronaldo vs. Messi, but you might get Miralem Pjanic vs. Arthur, which has the plusvalenza duel that you all were hoping to see when these two teams were drawn against each other a few weeks back.

But no matter who plays and who doesn’t, the fact that both Juventus and Barcelona are both still trying to figure plenty of things out under their new managers is very much the truth coming into this one.

Which team is able to overcome all of that will probably get the points.

I say probably because who really knows for sure how to predict things involving Juventus these days, right? I mean, they’ve played a newly promoted side two weekends ago and drawn, then did the same thing against a mid-table side in Serie A and drawn, so it’s not like their form is blowing us away by any means.

But still, this is a game where Juventus can show us a lot. Or it can be a complete mess where we’re left wanting to just bang our heads against the wall a lot like when they dropped points to Crotone or Hellas Verona.

Either way, the next couple of hours will be interesting. And nervy. But hopefully a little more interesting than nervy.

MATCH INFO

When: Wednesday, Oct. 28, 2020

Where: Allianz Stadium, Turin, Italy

Official kickoff time: 9 p.m. local time in Italy and across Europe; 8 p.m. in the United Kingdom; 4 p.m. Eastern Time; 1 p.m. Pacific Time

STARTING LINEUPS

Juventus starting XI (3-4-1-2/4-4-2): Szczesny; Cuadrado, Demiral, Bonucci, Danilo; Kulusevski, Bentancur, Rabiot, Chiesa; Dybala, Morata

Juventus bench: Buffon, Pinsoglio, De Winter, Frabotta, Riccio, Arthur, Ramsey, McKennie, Bernardeschi, Portanova

Barcelona starting XI (4-2-3-1): Neto; Sergi Roberto, Araujo, Lenglet, Jordi Alba; Pjanic, De Jong; Pedri, Messi, Dembelé; Griezmann

Barcelona bench: Inaki Pena, Tenas, Dest, Busquets, Alena, Braithwaite, Ricard Puig, Trincao, Ansu Fati, Junior Firpo

HOW TO WATCH

Television: UniMás, TUDN USA (United States); BT Sport 3 (United Kingdom); Sky Sport Uno, Sky Sport 252, Canale 5 (Italy)

Online/mobile: CBS All Access, Univision NOW, TUDN App, TUDN.com, TUDNxtra (United States); DAZN (Canada); BTSport.com, BT Sport App (United Kingdom); Sky Go Italia (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.