Juventus could’ve done better, admits Pirlo after defeat against Porto

Juventus manager Andrea Pirlo is disappointed after being beaten by Porto and said that his team “could’ve done better” in the match.

Juventus suffered a 2-1 defeat at the hands of Porto in the first leg of their Champions League last-16 tie here Thursday.

“Our approach changed after a minute because when you concede a goal like that so early on, it knocks your confidence. The players let their heads drop and Porto were able to play the game that they wanted to play, shutting up shop and playing on the counter,” the club’s official website quoted Pirlo as saying.

“Fortunately, we managed to get back into the tie ahead of the second leg through Chiesa’s goal. We shouldn’t have played like that and it’s a shame. We could’ve done better. We had prepared for a different match. We wanted to attack the space in the behind with our forwards and our wingers and we needed to move the ball faster because they defended well, but they gave us space out wide. When you attack down the middle against 11 players behind the ball, everything becomes harder,” he added.

Juventus were left stunned after 70 seconds on the clock when Porto grabbed an early lead through Mehdi Taremi. Interestingly, with this, Taremi had become the fifth Iranian player to score in the UEFA Champions League and the first in the knockout stage.

Porto extended their lead soon after the beginning of the second half after Moussa Marega collected Wilson Manafa’s cut-back and fired a brilliant goal. In the 82nd minute, Federico Chiesa scored the only goal for Juventus.

Juventus and Porto will take on each other in the second leg on March 10.

(Only the headline and picture of this report may have been reworked by the Business Standard staff; the rest of the content is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)

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