Conte fears Juventus fatigue

Antonio Conte is keeping his fingers crossed that his Juventus players have the energy to pick up a result at Roma on Saturday.

The Bianconeri face their third game in eight days after their wins over Fiorentina in Serie A and Celtic in the Champions League.

“The players are in good shape, I’ll just have to see if anyone needs a rest,” the tactician stated on Friday afternoon.

“The idea is to, more or less, go with the side that has done well in these past two games. But I do fear tiredness – that’s why I would have preferred to have had the match scheduled for Sunday.”

The League leaders are eight places and 21 points better off than Roma, but the Coach still respects the capital threat.

“They have a great squad and they’ll be really motivated against us,” he added.

“Roma have great technical value. They started the season aiming for the top spots, now they’ve slowed down a bit. But this will be a really difficult game.”

Juve will go into the tie on the back of an impressive showing in Europe this week, where they put one foot in the last eight of the European Cup.

“Our morale is certainly sky high after that win. We’ve won a lot of praise, but they shouldn’t weigh us down.

“I’m proud that we are in the same competition as Real Madrid and Manchester United. We’re an outsider who can cause problems.

“We want to enter the elite of football, but now we’ll dive back into the championship.”

When asked about his striking choices, he suggested that Mirko Vucinic and Alessandro Matri would retain their starting shirts.

“I always choose the players who are at their best and I have the good fortune that I have five forwards to choose from. Right now is the moment for Vucinic and Matri.”

The tactician also provided an update on the injured Giorgio Chiellini. “I hope that he will be back training with the squad in the week, with an eye on having him back for the Siena game.”

Kwadwo Asamoah and Paul Pogba are expected to replace the suspended Federico Peluso and Claudio Marchisio.
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Enough talk about fantasy transfers and who we are going to play in the next round of CL. Let's talk about Roma. Like Conte, I'm worried about a letdown and fatigue. Hopefully, Asamoah can provide a boost to the team.

Pogba and Asa should play. Anelka + Matri should play

i don't understand Conte's play your best team every game philosophy. the point of having a squad is to allow you to rotate + cover for injuries no? obviously, we're down a couple players, but lich, vucinic and matri should also be rested. isla needs time to find some form and it's not like gio and quags are mugs

I think Lichtsteiner, Pirlo, and Vidal are all fatigued after their performance vs Celtic. But the match vs Roma is a big one and we cannot afford to rest too many players because Napoli isn't far behind.

Whatever Conte decides to do in regards to the line-up, he should definitely rest some players when Juve play Siena next week because Napoli is right after that.