Acid Test For Chievo As Juventus Come To Town
MILAN, Jan 25 (AFP) - Dark horses Chievo will start to find out Sunday evening if they really are thoroughbreds or just also-rans after all as Juventus come to town for a crunch Italian first division match.
Chievo, who made headlines worldwide when they topped the Italian first division for six weeks earlier this season in their first ever campaign in the top flight, have shown signs of slipping in recent weeks, a trend confirmed by last week's 3-1 defeat at Bologna.
That result left them in fourth place eight points behind leaders Inter Milan although the unfashionable outfit from Verona still has a game in hand.
Luigi del Neri, the man who has plotted Chievo's rise to the top, has insisted all season long that avoiding relegation is their only objective.
And the Cinderella club's coach is well aware he may soon start to turn into a pumpkin as he faces Juve followed by Wednesday's tough assignment with Lazio, a match postponed in December because of a frozen pitch amid farcical scenes when the referee decided the surface was unfit minutes before kick off.
Third-placed Juve are the in-form team in the division and a run of four consecutive wins has put them within four points of Inter but Chievo will be determined to make amends for their 3-2 defeat by Juve in Turin earlier this season, a match where they led 2-0 but were eventually undone by a dubious penalty award.
Leaders Inter and second-placed Roma have, on the face of it, far easier assignments this weekend.
Inter coach Hector Cuper this week again took them to the Balearic Islands for a sunshine break - the Argentinian formerly coached Real Mallorca - and the leaders will fly straight from the holiday island to Venice to face bottom club Venezia.
Defending champions Roma host Piacenza at the Olympic Stadium but are unlikely to underestimate their opponents who inflicted the only defeat of the season on Fabio Capello's side back in September.
AC Milan are losing touch with the leaders and will be anxious not to slip further when they host northerners Udinese at the San Siro.
The 'Rossoneri' slipped up again last weekend when a penalty miss by Ukrainian striker Andriy Shevchenko and a mistake by veteran midfielder Demetrio Albertini allowed Fiorentina to snatch a point in injury time.
Albertini, Paolo Maldini (currently injured) and Alessandro Costacurta are the three survivors of the 'Grande Milan' team that dominated European and World club football in the late 1980s and early 1990s and some pundits are now openly suggesting that they are past their sell-by date.
Any decision to offload the three 'senators' would be down to coach Carlo Ancelotti, who played alongside them in the club's glory days.
Lazio will be looking for a win at Turin against Torino ahead of Wednesday's meeting with Chievo, aware that they can afford few further mistakes if they are to feature in the Scudetto reckoning.
Lazio are still reeling from the news that their Dutch international defender Jaap Stam has been handed a five-month ban after testing positive for nandrolone.
Similarily Brescia, who travel to Lecce, will be without their Spanish international midfielder Josep Guardiola, who received a four-month ban from the Italian football federation's disciplinary commission.
Guardiola tested positive on two occasions for taking the same banned anabolic steroid as Stam, who joined Lazio last summer in a shock move from Manchester United.
The two stars, who turned up traces of norandrosterone and Noretiocolonalone, both derivatives of nandrolone, also received fines of 50,000 euros (45,000 dollars).
Meanwhile, Bologna hope to continue their impressive season when they visit Parma for a local derby on Saturday night while Atalanta host Fiorentina and Brescia travel to Lecce in games that could have an impact on the relegation dogfight.
Fixtures (14:00 GMT unless stated)
Saturday: Parma v Bologna (19:30 GMT)
Sunday: Atalanta v Fiorentina, Lecce v Brescia, AC Milan v Udinese, Perugia v Verona, AS Roma v Piacenza, Torino v Lazio, Venezia v Inter Milan, Chievo v Juventus (19:30 GMT)
