All or Nothing: Juventus
Photo Courtesy of Juventus
This past November, Amazon Prime’s docu-series “All or Nothing,” had its eyes on Italy’s most decorated football club, Juventus. With a total of 70 trophies, Juventus has been a titan not only in Italy, but also on the world’s greatest club football stage known to man. The European UEFA Champions League features only the best teams from European countries with the likes of Spain’s Real Madrid and England’s Manchester United. Despite a league full of powerhouse teams, Juventus has won the competition twice and most recently reached the finals in 2017.
“All or Nothing” followed Juventus’ journey throughout their 2020-2021 season and the most pivotal moments that led to both an exciting and disappointing season. The crew followed the team on and off the pitch as they went through meals together, training sessions, market
Transfers and games. The docu-series puts the viewer amongst some of the greatest soccer players in the world as they go about their day-to-day endeavors. One of the most candid moments viewers got to see was when Italian and Juventus superstars and veterans Gianluigi Buffon and Giorgio Chiellini talked to the American Weston McKennie during a team lunch. McKennie was filmed explaining how he prefers his pizza with ranch, but as Italian’s, Buffon and Chiellini were dumbfounded and laughed as their language barrier made for an even funnier interaction with the rookie.
This season for Juventus kicked off with three big transfers that ultimately has led to success as the team has carried on. The first being American National Team star Weston McKennie, the second is an Italian European Cup winner, Federico Chiesa and most importantly, arguably one of the greatest football players ever, Cristiano Ronaldo. These three players made a huge impact on the team as they produced a combined 48 goals and 15 assists amongst the three of them.
With international football legend Andrea Pirlo as the new coach, Juventus managed to win two out of their four potential trophies. Two of those being their 9th Italian Super Cup Champions trophy and their 14th Italian cup trophy. Unfortunately, with their eyes set on the UEFA Champions league trophy, they came up short in the round of 16 against an incredibly tough Portuguese squad, Porto F.C. As the final aggregate result came to a four to four draw, Porto came out victorious as they managed to score more goals as the away visiting team. This gut-wrenching loss showed behind the scenes into the locker room atmosphere that has never been seen from some of these players. In the moment you could see stars who have won trophies their entire lives fall to the ground and sit back crying as they dealt with the news of defeat. One being Cristiano Ronaldo who was in tears as he sat alone wondering what went wrong. This just came to show the love and passion for the game that some of these players like Ronaldo have, who although has the most Champions League appearances, goals, wins and many more records, is not satisfied with almost winning.
Moreover, after winning nine consecutive domestic league titles, Juventus fell short of reaching their 37th Italian Seria A championship trophy. After some tough draws and losses through the season, they were not able to keep up with other Italian squads. Fortunately, Juventus were able to stay within the top four teams which gave them a ticket to the following year’s UEFA Champions League tournament.
As the 2021-2022 season is on its way, Juventus is a strong contender once again for another year to add more trophies. They just recently made it to the Round of 16 again, and they are hungry for redemption. All in all, the docu-series shed light on the victories, the failures and the family that Juventus has built.
