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Ask a Juventus supporter whether winning the Champions League is an obsession and you’ll likely be met with a snort of derision. Obsession? No, the feeling is far, far stronger.
Perhaps Bill Shankly’s take on football’s importance relative to life and death would be more appropriate.
Juve, by far the most successful Italian club domestically, have lost a record seven European Cup or Champions League finals, including their last five in a row. They have won the competition just twice, most recently in 1996, prompting a neurosis to develop at the club like a striker anxiously trying to end a goal drought.
After the most recent final defeat – against Real Madrid in Cardiff two seasons ago – Gregorio Sorgi, vice-president of the London Juventus Official Fan Club, recalls some supporters even claiming that the club has a Champions League “curse”. Two final defeats and two other agonising exits in the last four years will do that to you.
And so to Tuesday night where one of football’s longest running soap operas continues at Old Trafford, with Juve taking on Manchester United.
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