Zinedine Zidane and Alessandro Del Piero recently got together to launch a collection of adidas jerseys and the two former Juventus players certainly remember their explosive partnership at the Bianconeri. The French playmaker, who arrived in Piedmont in 1996, won two Serie A titles in 1997 and 1998 and also lost two Champions League finals in the same years, against Borussia Dortmund (1-3) and then Real Madrid (0-1). The Ballon d’Or 98 went to the Casa Blanca in 2001…
During its glorious run in the Champions League, Juve notably crushed AS Monaco in the semi-final first leg on 1 April 1998 at the Stadio delle Alpi. The club from the Principality had caused a surprise by knocking out Manchester United in the previous round. A nightmare evening for Fabien Barthez in Turin! Del Piero opened the scoring with a magnificent free-kick (34th). Costinha (known as Da Costa during his time in France) equalised (44th), but “Zizou” escaped in the area only to be brought down by Barthez. Penalty converted by Del Piero (45th), who then scored a hat-trick thanks to another penalty kick (62nd).
Zidane concludes the offensive festival
Monaco tried to reduce the gap, with the entry of Thierry Henry (67th) and Stéphane Carnot (74th) to feed David Trezeguet, but Juventus of Didier Deschamps and Edgar Davids in midfield finally won 4-1 thanks to Zidane at the end of the match. Coming out of a one-two with Del Piero, the number 21 of the Old Lady resisted the return of Philippe Christanval to adjust Barthez with a shot from the edge of the area (88th).
In the return match at Louis-II, Nicola Amoruso (15th) and Alessandro Del Piero (74th) made Fabien Barthez’s net tremble and Jean Tigana’s Monegasques, thanks to Philippe Léonard, Thierry Henry and Robert Spehar in the 83rd minute, snatched an insufficient 3-2 victory. Barthez, Deschamps, Zidane, Henry, Trezeguet, as well as Martin Djetou (finally sidelined by Aimé Jacquet) all found themselves at Clairefontaine a few months later to prepare for the 98 World Cup in France.
