Spezia 2-3 Juventus: Player ratings as Juve earn first league win of the season
Juventus were made to work for their first win of the Serie A season, coming from behind to beat newly-promoted Spezia on Wednesday evening.
As expected the visitors had the better of the opening exchanges, with Matthijs de Ligt spurning a great chance to give his side the lead inside the first 15 minutes - lofting a volleyed effort over the crossbar from a corner kick.
Juve then deservedly took the lead through Moise Kean. The young forward - on loan from Everton - latched onto a knock-down header from Adrien Rabiot before rifling the ball into the bottom left corner of the net.
Moments later, however, they were pegged back by Spezia. Emmanuel Gyasi hammered the ball into the top right corner of Wojciech Szczesny's goal via a slight deflection off Danilo. The strike made it the 19th consecutive Serie A game in which Juve have conceded in - which, no, isn't good.
To make matters worse, La Vecchia Signora then conceded another at the start of the second half - Janis Antiste's deflected strike squirming past Szczesny in the Juve goal.
The visitors pressed forward in search of an equaliser in the final half an hour, with Bonucci heading over from three yards out (great stuff), and were rewarded for their efforts when Chiesa squirmed past a tackle in the penalty area to rifle home the leveller.
Juventus pressed forward in droves after making it 2-2 and finally retook the lead through De Ligt, who repented for his earlier miss with a lovely goal in the 72nd minute - volleying home from a corner kick.
Here's how the Juve players rated.
Juventus player ratings
1. Goalkeeper & defenders
Wojciech Szczesny (GK) - 6/10 - Could do nothing about either deflected goal, and then made a sublime save to maintain Juve's 3-2 lead.
Danilo (RB) - 5/10 - Slow to get across to prevent Gyasi from taking the strike on goal which made it 1-1.
Matthijs de Ligt (CB) - 7/10 - Bagged the all-important winner.
Leonardo Bonucci (CB) - 4/10 - Looked painfully slow in his recovery run in the lead up to the second goal.
Mattia De Sciglio (LB) - N/A - He did literally nothing. I did more for Juventus by sitting on my sofa in London.
2. Midfielders
Federico Chiesa (RM) - 8/10 - Looked very rusty on his first start back following a hamstring injury, but sparked into life after scoring. Seriously gifted player.
Weston McKennie (CM) - 5/10 - Worked hard, but lacked quality. Which is usually the case with McKennie.
Rodrigo Bentancur (CM) - 4/10 - Looked leggy in the middle of the park. If Juve are going to do anything good this season, Bentancur's performances need to improve.
Adrien Rabiot (LM) - N/A - Does his assist for the opener warrant his inclusion in the starting XI? Or his inclusion in the squad at all? Not for me Clive. It says a lot that two Juventus starters didn't even deserve a rating for their performances.
3. Forwards
Paulo Dybala (ST) - 5/10 - Nowhere near the level of performance he showed on Sunday evening against Milan.
Moise Kean (ST) - 6/10 - Scored a wonderful goal to open the scoring, but wasn't involved at all thereafter.
4. Substitutes
Alex Sandro - N/A.
Alvaro Morata - 6/10 - Made a difference when he came on through his sheer work rate.
Manuel Locatelli - 6/10 - He needs to start every single game.
Federico Bernardeschi - N/A.
Dejan Kulusevski - N/A.