Allegri had clearly taken this match more seriously.
If Juventus wanted to establish themselves as the kings of Serie A, the Coppa Italia title was not something they could afford to miss either.
One interesting observation was that although Juventus were also widely recognised as one of Serie A's powerhouses, they somehow never quite matched AC Milan in the perception of fans back in the East.
The reason was simple: during their peak years, AC Milan lifted the Champions League trophy as if it were the easiest thing in the world.
Any side that faced AC Milan in the Champions League would tremble at the prospect.
(Note: this refers specifically to those peak years.)
Yet even though Juventus were currently at their own peak, they always seemed somehow unstable in the Champions League.
Even when Juventus reached the Champions League final, you would still find yourself thinking that it probably was not going to happen for them.
The frustrating part was that, looking at the actual results, it really never did.
Of course, that was also tied to the broader decline of Serie A as a whole.
It would not be fair to lay all of that at Juventus's door.
Compared to the league fixture, Allegri had made very few personnel changes for this match.
The only adjustment was up front, where Llorente was replaced by Morata.
The Tevez and Morata partnership remained one part height, one part pace.
That said, although Morata stood at one metre ninety, his pace and agility were nothing to underestimate.
Compared to Llorente, the young Morata had a certain spark and instinct about him.
At this point, almost every manager in Serie A was wrestling with the same question: how do you break down the goal guarded by Leon?
After weathering two rounds of scepticism, Leon had firmly established himself as a name in Serie A.
As only the second player from the East to appear in Serie A, every club had started to take notice of Leon.
The issue, however, was that Leon's position was goalkeeper.
Once the coaching staff at each club began paying closer attention, they found there was not actually much they could set up tactically.
Unlike outfield players, where you could organise man-marking and specific assignments, what exactly were you supposed to do about a goalkeeper?
There was no way to mark him out of the game — it was down to the players on the pitch to find their own way past the goal Leon was guarding.
Morata had suffered a serious injury at the start of the season.
He had only returned to the squad over the past two matches.
Both of those appearances had come off the bench, and he had performed very well.
This match was Morata's first start since his return from injury.
Standing back at the centre circle ahead of kick-off, the twenty-one-year-old Morata was visibly buzzing with excitement.
Just moments ago in the dressing room, Allegri had pulled him aside with a specific instruction: pay attention to Leon's saves, and put more thought into your finishing.
But when Morata glanced over at Leon, that face looking even younger than his own simply failed to register as a threat.
'Is a goalkeeper this young actually reliable?'
'Everything he's done up to now has just been good fortune.'
'Watch me break through his goal without any trouble.'
Morata was radiating confidence.
The referee blew his whistle, and the match was underway.
Juventus kicked off.
After the start, Juventus played with composure, circulating the ball through their own half rather than launching a direct attack on AC Milan.
With an away goal already in the bank, Juventus had no reason to rush forward.
A draw in this match would be enough to send Juventus through to the final.
Fifteen minutes passed quickly, and neither side had managed a single shot.
Juventus were deliberately keeping possession and dictating the tempo of the match.
On the few occasions AC Milan managed to receive the ball, they were met with firm and uncompromising defending from Juventus and could not manufacture a shooting opportunity.
Throughout those fifteen minutes, Leon and Buffon were simply spectators in front of their respective goals.
Neither of them had so much as a reason to move.
"I think Leon looks absolutely dripped out with that mask on — instantly on another level."
"Does anyone know where to get one? I want to buy one."
"Search on Taobao, should already be up."
The fans back in the East were watching in the early hours and were nearly falling asleep.
Both sides were playing in a completely stifling fashion.
The fans had nothing to do but chat amongst themselves to stay awake.
Back in the commentary booth, Jackson and Donny were also scrambling to fill the silence.
"Donny, I've heard Leon's training regime is absolutely gruelling."
"Do you think that might be the secret to his success?"
"Is it something our own players should be looking to take on board?"
Jackson was trying to steer the conversation toward a positive angle about Leon's work ethic, so he raised the topic deliberately.
Donny, however, was not about to follow the expected script.
"I actually have some reservations about that."
"I specifically went and looked for footage of Leon's training sessions."
"That training regime is extreme — there is no scientific basis to it whatsoever."
"Training that way carries a very real risk of burning a player out completely."
"Training needs to be done properly and methodically, and Leon's approach is not something I would recommend to anyone."
"What genuinely baffles me right now is that after training like that, Leon still hasn't picked up an injury — that in itself is something of a miracle."
Donny spoke at length and with conviction.
His remarks, however, immediately sparked an enormous backlash.
"Rubbish commentary."
"Is he actually cursing my man Leon out?"
"And now you understand exactly why football in the East is finished — the commentators think you don't need to train hard. What's even the point then?"
"Seeing all of this just makes you realise how much harder Leon has had to work than everyone else."
Donny: that is not what I was trying to say at all.
Jackson had not anticipated that kind of response from Donny, and for a moment he was at a loss for how to steer things back.
What Donny had said was not wrong — the higher the level of sport, the more important it was that training be conducted scientifically.
Jackson had looked into Leon's training quite thoroughly himself, and it genuinely was not scientific.
The only explanation was that Leon was simply a physical anomaly, someone who could withstand a training method that was borderline self-destructive.
Even so, Donny really should not have come in from that angle just now.
Now Jackson was left in an awkward position.
Fortunately, the situation on the pitch shifted at that very moment.
The two of them turned their attention back to the match.
Out on the pitch, Morata was making run after run, darting in every direction.
Because AC Milan were still operating their offside trap, Morata had been making a great number of runs to beat it.
What he could not understand, though, was why Pirlo, who had always been so sharp at picking the right moment to play a ball forward, kept refusing to release it in this match.
After successfully beating the offside line several times with perfectly timed runs, Morata's patience finally ran out.
"Hey, you should be playing it forward, not passing it back every time!"
After watching Pirlo roll the ball back to Bonucci again, Morata finally snapped and called out to him.
"That ball just now, if you had played it through, I was clean through on goal."
"A one-on-one — that was a one-on-one opportunity!"
"Next time, you have to play it to me!"
Morata made a point of jogging over to Pirlo and pressing the point home.
Pirlo looked at the slightly agitated Morata and gave a small nod.
He was about to say something, then thought better of it.
Without taking a proper beating from the situation, Morata was never going to accept the lesson.
Nothing Pirlo said right now would get through to him.
In the twenty-second minute, Morata produced another brilliant run and slipped in behind the AC Milan backline.
This time, Pirlo's pass arrived exactly as promised.
Morata beat the offside trap.
A one-on-one had arrived.
Morata bore down on goal, driving toward the penalty area at full pace while checking with his peripheral vision whether any AC Milan player was tracking back.
What surprised him was that no AC Milan player gave chase at all.
In fact, all the players on both sides had simply stopped where they were and stood watching as Morata bore in on goal.
'Perfect.'
Morata had not expected AC Milan's players to simply give up on the chase and hand him the goal like a gift.
Facing Leon coming off his line, Morata let fly with a driven low shot.
Morata threw his arms wide, turned to face the home supporters, and had already let out the first half of a roar, bracing himself to be swept up by the crowd's celebration.
But the look on the Juventus home supporters' faces was, somehow, completely blank.
What was going on?!
When Morata looked back toward Leon, he found that Leon did not appear to have made any particularly dramatic save — he seemed to have simply stayed on his feet and stopped the shot without much fuss at all.
Was my shot really that poor?
Morata was beginning to question everything about himself.
"He's saved it, just as expected."
"What do I do — I'm terrified every time my side gets a one-on-one now. This is painful."
"Morata looked like a complete fool out there."
Up in the stands, the home supporters had gone completely Zen.
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