From the papers

September 14, 2000
Juventus Official Site

Filippo Inzaghi takes all the plaudits and most of the column inches in the sports press today following last night's goal-fest away to Hamburg. Surely he has now buried his critics under a flurry of goals.

The Gazzetta dello Sport headlines with, "Inzaghi, fantastic hat-trick", before it goes on the blame the defence for squandering Pippo's three away goals. On Tuesday the Bianconeri will face Panathinaikos at the Delle Alpi, after the Greek outfit drew 1-1 at home to the Spanish champions Deportivo La Coruna. The inside pages go into more depth: "Top-notch Inzaghi not enough." Juve go 3-1 up but then Hamburg level it and go on to take the lead. Inzaghi has to perform another miracle, getting himself a penalty and converting it to make it 4-4 with two minutes to spare.

On subsequent pages in the Milan pink, Juve's man of the match admitted he was unhappy with the result, but was pleased with his own display: "This is my magic moment" - few could argue. He then stepped in to defend Alex Del Piero. "All is going well for me, but don't lay into Alex," he insisted. Of his strike partner he said, "He had a good game, and the goal he missed should go down to good goalkeeping." He went on, "I don't care about the top scorers chart, I just want the cup."

Another headline highlighted Carlo Ancelotti's regrets: "Four goals and no win," which speaks volumes... The Juve manager added, "We should have closed the match when we were 3-1 up, but we ended up paying for the post hit by Kovacevic."

The Corriere dello Sport leads with, "Crazy Juve!" The Rome daily manages to praise and damn the performance in one line: "Super Inzaghi saves a crazy Juve." The daily also points out that the ex-Piacenza man is now at 25 goals in Europe and only two goals off Roberto Bettega's record.

Inzaghi continues to live his golden moment in Tuttosport: "Grazie Inzaghi!" it headlines. But Del Piero appears unable to escape his anything but golden moment... "Del Piero in crisis" it reports. Kovacevic came on for the troubled number 10 and promptly hit the post. Inzaghi, however, gave Alex a lift, saying, "Sooner or later he will come out of it, we just need patience." Until then, let's hope Pippo keeps up the good work!
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