Coppa Italia Game Time Thread: Juventus vs. Genoa

It was exactly one month ago that Juventus faced Genoa at the Luigi Ferraris, a place where Bianconeri teams of years past have gone and come back to Turin with plenty of disappointing results. It was a lot like many Juve games that we’ve seen this season — the Italian champions far from impressing against a team that is toward the bottom of the table.

The good news is that tonight’s Coppa Italia Round of 16 matchup between Juventus and Genoa is in Turin, not at the Marassi. So that right there is hopefully a good omen heading into Juve’s first dalliance in the Coppa Italia during the 2020-21 season.

In a perfect world, Juventus manager Andrea Pirlo would have a chance to rotate much of his squad, give some bench players who haven’t played all that much lately some much-needed minutes and then we’d be on our merry way. But, since 2020 has been an extension of 2020 through the first couple weeks of the calendar year, this is far from a perfect world.

While Pirlo is expected to do some sort of squad rotation, it probably isn’t the extent that we’ve seen some of Juventus’ managers do in years past. Simply because of the handful of injuries that are suddenly on the table and the trio of players who are still out due to their positive COVID-19 diagnosis, the chances for Pirlo to rotate isn’t as plentiful as we would have liked.

But, no matter who’s available, Pirlo has made it clear that Juventus’ intentions involve winning the Coppa Italia — which, despite what we may think of it, is something that has eluded the Old Lady the last two years.

And, let’s face it: it sure would be nice to see Juve not be sitting on (un)lucky No. 13 in terms of Coppa Italia triumphs for much longer. So, hopefully, this is the first step toward Coppa Italia No. 14 for the biggest and most accomplished team in the country.

MATCH INFO

When: Wednesday, Jan. 13, 2021

Where: Allianz Stadium, Turin, Italy

Official kickoff time: 8:45 p.m. local time in Italy and across Europe; 7:45 p.m. in the United Kingdom; 2:45 p.m. Eastern Time; 11:45 a.m. Pacific Time

STARTING LINEUPS

Juventus starting XI (3-5-2/4-4-2): Buffon; Demiral, Dragusin, Chiellini; Bernardeschi, Portanova, Arthur, Bentancur, Wesley; Kulusevski, Morata

Juventus bench: Szczesny, Pinsoglio, Danilo, Bonucci, Frabotta, Capellini, Ramsey, Rabiot, Ranocchia, Ronaldo, Rafia, Felix Correia

Genoa starting XI (3-5-2): Paleari; Goldaniga, Bani, Dumbravanu; Ghiglione, Lerager, Rovella, Melegoni, Czyborra; Pjaca, Scamacca

HOW TO WATCH

Television: BT Sport 3 (United Kingdom); RAI Uno (Italy)

Online/mobile: ESPN+ (United States); DAZN (Canada); BTSport.com, BT Sport app (United Kingdom); RAI Play (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.