Dybala Stars As Juventus Sink Young Boys

By Max Wise

Cristiano Ronaldo did not play, but Juventus still found enough venom to poison Young Boys as Paulo Dybala’s hat-trick condemned the Switzerland giants to their second straight Champions League defeat of the season on Tuesday.

Juventus won 2-0 at Valencia a fortnight ago, and a red card to Ronaldo in that game forced the Portuguese goal poacher out of the campaign’s second round of fixtures.

But, Dybala stepped up in style for the Italian champions in front of the 40,961 spectators at the Allianz Stadium, by scoring in the 5th, 33rd, and the 69th minutes to give the ‘Old Lady of Serie A’, a second straight win in Europe this term.

Juventus kicked off after referee Sergey Karasev’s whistle and gave the visitors no room to settle into the game as Paulo Dybala put the hosts ahead in the 5th minute with a perfect finish to Leonardo Bonucci’s perfect cross.

The defender put a cross into the box and found Dybala, who launched a non-drop strike to it to bury the ball inside the right post.

Federico Bernardeschi fashioned a shot from the edge of the box, after receiving an accurate pass ten minutes later as Juventus kept pressing, but David von Ballmoos made a stunning save to stop the effort from flying into the bottom right corner.

Paulo Dybala found himself in a good shooting position just outside the box, five minutes later, and unleashed a first-time shot low towards the middle of the target which the goalkeeper saved.

Young Boys’ Leonardo Bertone went into the referee’s book with a yellow card in the 24th minute, and Dybala extended Juventus’ lead in the 34th minute when he got to the right place at the right time to connect Blaise Matuidi’s rebound strike into the middle of the net.

Gerardo Seoane replaced Sekou Sanogo Junior with Sandro Lauper, after the restart, and David von Ballmoos received an ovation from the crowd in the 57th minute when he managed to block Miralem Pjanic’s header which was heading towards the left side of the goal.

Paulo Dybala completed his hat-trick in the 69th minute when he fed on Juan Cuadrado’s pass to slot the ball into an empty net.

Sandro Lauper was unlucky in the 75th minute when his goal-bound effort from the edge of the box met a classy goalkeeping by Wojciech Szczesny, and Mohamed Aly Camara made matters worse for Young Boys in the five minutes later when he received the marching off orders with his second yellow card of the game.

Alex Sandro had a goal-bound header blocked to safety in the 80th minute, and both teams failed to record anymore meaningful openings, after Sami Khedira received a brilliant pass in 85th minute, but shot narrowly wide from inside the penalty box.