Although the second leg of the Coppa Italia semi-final is due to Wednesday, Torino did not bring forward this weekend's league game to Saturday due to only one European game played last Thursday. And because the opponent Verona is too weak to be considered to be uninteresting, the kick-off time of this league game was also put into the evening, resulting in six Serie A matches in the twenty-sixth round of Serie A before the start of the battle for Verona.

The night before, Inter Milan, who had previously finished fourth in the table, took the lead when they beat Benevento 2-0 at home thanks to goals from two centre-backs to temporarily close the gap on the Red Bulls to five points. Considering that Limdoudi's side are about to embark on a difficult schedule full of strong opponents, this gap will obviously give the Nerazzurri supporters hope of a comeback, which will require Torino to reduce unnecessary points conceded in order to remain third in the league after the penultimate round of games against Napoli.

Therefore, today's away game against the relegation favourites Verona must be won, and a draw is difficult to accept. In the minds of everyone in Turin, a visit to the Stadio Marco Antonio Bentagotti should be as easy as a formality, as it is a short trip, after all, it is less than 300 kilometres from the city of Turin and is a world-renowned tourist destination. However, before the start of the game, no one expected that the home team, which was offered by the bookmaker to win at odds as high as 8.90, would score a goal shortly after the opening and maintain this advantage until halftime, which shocked the ground.

The home team of the Heras Hellas Hellas Hellona Football Club, founded in 1903, can be regarded as a team with a long history. Despite their lackluster results over the past 100 years, the 1984-85 season of beating Serie A giants and top-flight titles for the first time in their history has made them an integral part of Italian football's history. That year, Torino finished runners-up in the league, which led to a fierce rivalry between the two clubs.

It's a pity that the fight 23 years ago will seem like a joke in the future. After missing the perfect opportunity for a revival, the Red Bulls began to decline year by year, narrowly relegating to the second division four years later, and although they had a comeback in the early nineties, they began to fall into the elevator between Serie A and Serie B in the 1996-97 season, and it was not until five years ago that they once again established themselves in the top flight.

Verona, nicknamed Hellas or Hellas, was even worse, finishing 10th in the league the year after winning the title before being relegated to the second division in the mid-90s. After repeated promotions and relegations, he was relegated to the third division in the 2007-08 season, where he remained for four years. It wasn't until Andrea Mandolini, a native Italian coach who came through the Torino Academy as a player, took over the team that they regained some of their Serie A glory and returned to the top flight in 2013/14, only to struggle inside and outside the relegation zone.

After returning to the Serie A competition after a year as runners-up in Serie B last season, Verona were considered favourites for relegation, and their performance was not able to deliver a strong response. After 25 rounds, 4 wins, 3 draws, 18 losses and 15 points, only in front of Benevento, who had the worst start to the top five European leagues, scored 21 goals and conceded 51 goals respectively, which is also one of the worst performances in the entire league. With the exception of a handful of die-hard fans, no one could have imagined that they would have a chance to beat third-placed Torino in the table, even though Fabio Pecchia's side had previously beaten equally strong AC Milan and Fiorentina.

In detail, the coaches of the two teams are still old acquaintances. In the first half of the 2015-16 season, as Benitez's assistant coach in Napoli's final year, Pekia also followed the boss to the Bernabeu and became an assistant coach of Real Madrid's first team. Li Mudi happened to be the coach of Real Madrid's reserve team that year, so the two still had a certain intersection at that time, although due to the short time, they didn't know much about each other, but the impression left on each other was still good.

Now that they met again in the Apennines, they naturally praised each other at the press conference before the start of the game, especially Pekia, who praised the Torino coach and even considered Li Mudi, who is ten years younger than him, to be his role model. But the compliment was seen as a powerful smokescreen from the start of the game, as the home coach looked to be the better one to coach from the perspective of the on-field performance of both sides.

Pekia, who briefly played for the Red Bulls in the 1999-2000 season, was not a well-known player in his playing days, and was never selected for the national team of all ages, and perhaps only the most senior fans would have some impression of him who was only 1.72 meters tall and inconspicuous in appearance. However, 501 appearances in 16 seasons for 11 different teams, including 337 Serie A games, and his ability to play on the left, centre and right sides of midfield played a crucial role in his later coaching career.

Trapped by the weakness of the team, Pekia cannot guarantee that he will lead the team to relegation, but he has helped the team especially many young players build enough confidence and ability during the year and a half in charge so far. Although the average age of the 26-year-old of Verona's first team is not the youngest of the 20 teams in Serie A, their starters are all "little shota". In today's home game against Torino, only the captain of the home team, Romulo, is 30 years old, and the rest are at least 20 years old, including seven under the age of 24, and winger Keane, who is on loan from Juventus, is only 18 years old, which can be said to be a dynamic lineup.

It was also thanks to the active performance of many young players that the Verona team was able to achieve and maintain a one-goal lead in the first half when the possession rate was only 40% and the shooting statistics were 2-of-4 to 7-3. The problem of young age and lack of experience, when morale is high and there is no psychological burden of wanting to win and being afraid of losing, often makes these young men burst out with unpredictable energy. And Li Mudi's team failed to play 100% of its strength in the first 45 minutes because of the light enemy and slow heat, so that the first half was always in a situation of being led by the nose by the opponent, which was really embarrassing.

Fortunately, the effect of the "Lee's hair dryer", which has not been used for a long time, is still quite powerful, and the Torino players, who have been criticized by the head coach for ten minutes, have been given a new tactical deployment in the last five minutes of the break, and finally came up with a new performance after the rematch, and soon equalized.

Just four minutes into the second half, the visitors played a quick three-man attack, Benassi sent in a through ball in midfield, and left winger Boyer dribbled forward at high speed, and was surrounded by three defenders at the top of the penalty area. The Argentine calmly crossed the ball diagonally to his right front to form a perfect assist, and Immobile, who had been waiting there for a long time, was not offside due to the retreat of Algerian Faris, who was playing at left wing-back, only to see that he did not make a stop adjustment, and fired a left-footed shot into the near corner about two meters from about two meters inside the penalty line. The ball didn't fly too fast, but the angle was tricky, and the suddenness of the ball meant that Verona's Brazilian goalkeeper Nicolás couldn't make an effective save, and the score was then rewritten to 1-1.

Although the hard-earned lead was erased, most of the home team's players had some disappointment on their faces. Even if they didn't have much hope of picking up three points from a strong opponent before the game, Varotti's first-half goal left the youngsters under the illusion that the Verona players, who would have been happy to have a draw, were inevitably psychologically affected by the fact that the chance to win slipped away from their hands. This has caused many of the home team's youngsters to fluctuate in their form and give the visitors a good chance to come back from defeat to win.

In the 66th minute, Li Mudi replaced Baseli and Belotti in succession to strengthen the team's attacking power. Red Babe, on the other hand, repaid the manager's trust five minutes later when he was brought down by a home defender from around six metres outside the penalty area to win a dangerous free-kick. The technique of direct free-kicks is undoubtedly the weakest link of the current Torino team, who have had more than 60 similar chances in the previous season without scoring a single goal, a level that is hardly commensurate with the third place in Serie A and the fourth place in the league overall goals.

Among the regular first-team players in the team, the player with the highest free-kick ability value is the veteran Gourcuff, who only joined at the end of last year, but it is only 15, which is not a small gap from the first-class masters, not to mention the top masters such as Juninho, Xiaobei and Pirlo. Therefore, in most cases where it is not the best chance, Torino players also choose to pass the ball and let their teammates grab points, and the proportion of choosing direct attacks is not too high. But today, Benasi, who has a free-kick rating of just 13, surprised everyone with his speed and angle, and it went straight to the top left corner of the home goal to help his team complete the reversal of the score.

However, after this goal, Verona's players also completely let go of the burden in their hearts, and finally found their previous competitive state, launching sharp attacks again and again, almost suppressing the away team in the half. In the 84th minute, Croatian high school striker Bruno Petkovic shook Torino central defender Moretti at the edge of the penalty area and fired a powerful left-footed volley, which was blocked by Kassi sideways. However, the second goal was scrambled by Varotti, who had been cut in just in time, on the left side of the box, and the home midfielder, who had already scored a goal, slotted home with his left foot before Bonifazi could block it. Unfortunately, in a hurry, this arch push could not be kicked at a better angle, and Cassie, who was desperate to get up quickly, hit the ball out of the goal line with a one-handed moon that shocked everyone.

The next moment, everyone inside and outside the stadium shifted their eyes to the referee on the bottom line, and after seeing his gesture of not scoring a goal, the entire Marco Antonio Bentegorti stadium fell into a huge wail.

In the end, with the weakness of the opponent's inexperience and the key save of San Cassie, Li Mudi led the team to win the away victory without danger, and struggled to get the three points that must be scored.

In a key matchup that ended at the same time as the battle for Victoria, Roma, who were previously fifth in the standings, lost by two goals at home to AC Milan, who have been in great form recently, and Gattuso also avenged the 0-2 defeat at home in the seventh round for his predecessor Montella. The result also widened the gap between the Red Bulls and the Red Wolves by a staggering eleven points, and if Li Moody can not lose to the capital side on the road next weekend, it will basically mean that the latter will have no chance to qualify for next season's Champions League.

Juventus, who were beaten by their rivals at the last minute on their own turf, were scheduled to continue to play at home to a strong Atalanta side in this round, and the old lady, who are three points behind Napoli, must win to maintain their hopes of winning the title. However, a sudden heavy snowfall disrupted the plans for a sixth consecutive Serie A title, and the city began to fall with snowflakes from Sunday morning, when the amount of snow did not go unnoticed. But just before the players on both sides could start warming up, the snow was getting heavier and heavier, and the snow in the stadium soon exceeded five centimetres. After the referee team and the Football Association officials checked the stadium together, the Serie A League finally announced that the match was cancelled, and the make-up date needs to be studied and decided at a meeting.

The postponement of the game will certainly do more harm than good to Juventus, who will have to play on three fronts, and will make it more difficult for them to play in the latter stages of the season. But as Juventus general manager Marotta said in an interview with the media, the heavy snow will certainly change the condition of the pitch and put the players at risk of potential injury, and playing in such conditions is irresponsible to the players, the club and even the sport of football. The Football Association quickly decided that the match would be played on March 14, and the old lady had not faced strong opponents in the two successive weekends, so she could show better form to face the son of the sea god who was not easy to deal with.

Atalanta, who have no European distractions, have won the time to prepare for the second leg of the Coppa Italia semi-final against Torino in three days' time. They will remain in Turin for the next two days of training and preparation, and the Poseidon Son, who can only win the domestic cup to qualify for next season's European competition, has already dominated the fitness of the players, and the possibility of recovering a goal away from home has become even greater.

The postponement of Juventus' current round of matches also gave leaders Napoli a chance to temporarily widen the gap between the points, and Maurizio Sarri's team beat Cagliari 5-0 away, winning 10 consecutive league games and becoming the most serious contenders to break the Bianconeri's hegemony in the eyes of the outside world.