The Old Lady - Juventus

Good luck, lad! Hope you will do a good job there!

Good luck!

Good luck I've done a Juve story before. T'was good fun!

Good luck!

Goooooooooooooooooooooood Luck

I love preseason, it's basically a holiday after a holiday, you get to go to different countries and learn about different cultures and this preseason was no different. But before that we had a little bit of business to take care of regarding the players to take on our two tours with us, that was settled by a friendly against the reserves, we split the teams up and had a game, first team against the reserves and youngsters. It was a relatively easy match, the first team winning 5-0, the first teamers did look very sharp to say that this is their first game back, and I'm not going to undermine my reserves or youngsters because they are very good players, as you have to be if you want to be at this club. It was just the fact that the first teamers were sharper and had that cutting edge. Like they say "Class is permanent"

With the issue regarding which players to take on the tours being sorted out, we jetted off to our first destination, which was Spain. We played a couple of games here:

• Espanyol
• Valencia
• Volendam (A dutch side also on tour in spain)
• Osasuna

We couldn't of started the tour any worse against Espanyol, we found ourselves 3-0 down before half time, and we had to work extremely hard to get the draw. Pirlo fired us back to 3-1 just after the restart and substitute Osvaldo cut the deficit to one on the 50th minute, we found it hard to find that final goal due to all of Espanyol's possession but we got out moment on the 91st minute when Girogio Chiellini scored a near post header to snatch a draw. We did tremendously to fight back but we should have never of been in that situation in the first place.

Our second game was against Champions League Qualifiers Valencia, we knew this would be a good test to see how we'd fair against Champions League opposition, I fielded as strong a team as I could for this game and we couldn't of got off to a better start with Llorente chipping the keeper from 20 yards, it was a fabulous strike, one he'll remember for a long time. (He still bangs on about it now) Valencia proved to be stubborn opposition and they scored a level on the 19th minute thanks to sloppy marking from a corner Oriol Romeu managed to score a header from three yards out. Both sides went in to half time locked level and Juventus started the second half the most dominant and we was rewarded a penalty on the 46th minute and it was tucked away by Vidal. Valencia was resilient again and managed to score again to level the game on the 48th minute thanks to Costa. The game ended at 2-2 but I wasn't too disappointed by the result because we played some brilliant football against a brilliant side.

Our third game saw us come up against Volendam, these are a Dutch side that were also on tour at the same time we was and we had spare time so we organised a friendly against them, it was a poor draw for us at 0-0, they defended brilliantly, we could really take a leaf out of their book, they were so resilient and it was amazing to watch as a coach, we dominated the game we had 35 shots and didn't manage to put one away but full credit to Volendam they defended magnificently!

Game four and our final one of the tour of Spain saw us come up against Osasuna, we managed to get our first win of the tour in this match as we ran out 1-0 winners, Giorgio Chiellini got the only goal of the match as he scored another one of his trademark headed goals from a Pirlo Corner. I was happy to get the first win of the tour but it should of perhaps come sooner!

Despite not getting 4 wins out of 4 on tour, I am relatively pleased with the tour of Spain. We worked hard in every game and there was positives to take from every game, also some negatives which will be addressed before we fly out to America.

We left Spain a little bit disappointed with ourselves that we only managed to collect a single win out of the 4 games whilst we was there, but we jetted off to America with a bit more hope, surely our preseason can only get better. We arrived in the US and finished our preseason here playing two MLS teams and Galatasaray to finish off the tour.

Our first game was against FC Dallas, we was in for a early shock as Austin Waguespack managed to score from a corner on the 34th minute, we was disappointed to have gave away another silly goal but we kept fighting and we took our chance in the 79th minute with a corner of our own, this time Barzagli headed home, a pleasant change from the free scoring Giorgio Chiellini. The Game finished 1-1 and morale in the camp was starting to slump.

Our second game in the US saw us come up against Philadelphia, I decided to shuffle the team around a bit and give a chance to some other faces, Pablo Osvaldo being one of them. He started the game and was brilliant from start to finish. He fired us 1-0 up in just under 7 minutes, but yet again we conceded a sloppy goal which could of been prevented as Devala Arena managed to slot home from 14 yards out. But we didn't give up and managed to grab a late winner courtesy of Pablo Osvaldo. The Italian forward has been great so far following his loan spell from Southampton and hopefully he can kick on and be a real threat for us this season.

Our final game of preseason saw us come up against Galatasaray, another team in the Champions League this season and it was a match I wanted to win, this game and the one against Valencia earlier in preseason will give me an early indication of where were at in terms of going up against quality teams in Europe. We got off to a poor start as Amrabat scored on the 12th minute, a beautifully executed freekick. Mirko Vucinic won a penalty and converted just on the stroke of half time to send the teams in level at the break. We came out of the blocks the fastest and Dany Nounkeu's own goal put us 2-1 up, but we was disappointed a minute later by a goal from Didier Drogba. We was resilient up until the final whistle and managed to grab a late victory as Paul Pogba headed home from a very late corner on the 91st minute.

Overall, the tour of the US was a great experience for us, we got two wins and a draw, and if you look at the overall picture of preseason. We remained unbeaten which is a great bonus, I think we can be happy with what we've accomplished in these past few weeks, we look ready to go when we face Lazio in the Italian Super Cup Final next week!

Penalty and late goal scored against Galata, what a match! Pogba's a hero here. All what matters in friendlies is teamwork and creating a stable, good team. Good luck!