Unexpected Heroes Step Up as Juventus Overcome Parma Without Yildiz

Ever since the great Claude Rains first uttered the immortal line “Round up the usual suspects!” in Casablanca, the phrase has been ingrained in the popular lexicon, so much so that it inspired the title of an entirely different movie nearly 50 years later. You hear it everywhere, in any context where you can expect to see a predictable set of participants.

On Saturday, a struggling Juventus were buoyed by a pair of very unusual suspects, players most fans figured would be gone, or at least on their way out the door, by this point in the transfer window. Unable to penetrate a deep-lying Parma defense, it was Nico González who gave a lifeless attack an instant shot in the arm, forcing a magical save before scoring a deflected goal off his own rebound to open the scoring. Then, with two minutes left, the game was sealed by another unlikely goalscorer: Teun Koopmeiners, who had just come on after an injury to Andrea Cambiaso and finished off a quick attack with a beautiful strike.

The unexpected redemption arcs from players most assumed were out of the team’s plans, or at least on the very fringes, were welcome developments for a squad that learned this week that their talisman, Kenan Yildiz, would miss two to three months once he undergoes surgery on a broken metatarsal. After a first half that seemed to be crying out for his creativity, it was the transfer-listed González who gave the Bianconeri the necessary spark to take Parma down 2-0 as they began to look forward to next week’s big match against AC Milan.

Apart from Yildiz, Luciano Spalletti was also missing Weston McKennie (muscle fatigue), Edon Zhegrova, and Khéphren Thuram, who suffered a setback in his knee recovery and could now require surgery. Jeff Ekhator came back to make his first Juve squad in a competitive game. Spalletti’s 4-2-3-1 was therefore shuffled a bit. Guglielmo Vicario started in goal after getting over the cramp that forced him off late against Frosinone. Pierre Kalulu and Zeki Çelik played on the defensive flanks, while Bremer was partnered with new signing Jhon Lucumí in the middle of defense. Manuel Locatelli and Douglas Luiz played in the midfield, while Francisco Conceição, Jonathan David, and Jérémie Boga supported Randal Kolo Muani in attack.

Carlos Cuesta lost his first Parma match last week against Cagliari, and was looking for something better here. His only missing player was former Juve prospect Hans Nicolussi Caviglia, who had to have a surgery of his own this week. Edoardo Corvi started behind a 4-4-2. Enrico Delprato, Mariano Troilo, Dominik Drobnic, and Emanuele Valeri arrayed themselves in front of him. Sascha Britschgi and Mandela Keita bookended Christian Ordóñez and Adrían Bernabé in midfield. El Bilal Touré and Simone Lontani started up front. Drobnic and Lontani were both teenagers, and the former was making his debut.

The game started slowly. Juve spent the first 10 minutes dominating possession but doing little with it. The tendency toward short corners continued, but they weren’t as effective as they were a week ago. Juve didn’t register a shot until eight minutes in when Luiz volleyed an attempted clearance way over. Parma looked to turn the flow of play around for a few minutes and Ordóñez pulled the ball wide on a ball headed down to him in the box.

Within five minutes or so Juve had wrestled control of proceedings back into their hands, although most of their attacks took the form of crosses from the right wing. Luiz banged a direct free kick into the wall, then scuffed a shot wide after a nice passing move.

Conceição was deeply unlucky in the 33rd minute when he let rip from 25 yards and beat Corvi but bashed the ball into the goalpost. It wasn’t until the 42nd minute that Juve finally registered a shot on target when Luiz headed a neat Kalulu cross right at the Parma keeper.

Spalletti made no changes at the half, but Juve did start ramping up the level of play as the second period began. Less than four minutes after the restart they ran another short corner routine, and Lucumí missed scoring on his debut by about a foot, firing a header just over the bar. David prompted a round of jeers from the crowd when a ball fell to him with room to work in the box, but skewed it badly off target when he went for power. Kolo Muani likewise pulled his shot wide from a pullback by Conceição.

Spalletti was far quicker off the mark on substitutions than he was a week ago. It was the 57th minute when he withdrew David (to another round of jeers) for González and sent on Kerim Alajbegovic for his debut in place of Boga.

Within two minutes of being on the field, González hit a 19-yard volley off an attempt at a clearance and forced a fabulous save out of Corvi, who diverted it behind with a flying one-handed parry. Two minutes later, the Argentine was afforded a ton of space and fired a powerful, long-range effort. This one banged off the post, but the rebound went right back into his path, and his second attempt took a deflection off Troilo that wrong-footed Corvi, who could do nothing but watch the ball dribble into the net.

Parma tried to conjure an instant response. Substitute David Romero, making his debut for Parma, was given too much room by Lucumí and shot from range, prompting a parry from Vicario and a clearance by Bremer to keep Touré from the rebound. Benjamín Cremaschi stole the ball back from Alajbegovic, and Delprato sent in a cross that found its way back to Romero. His header was a good one, but Vicario managed to lunge to his left and claw it off the line.

González led Kolo Muani with a beautiful pass into the right channel, but Corvi made himself big and denied him with a kick save, then the Frenchman popped his header over on the corner. After the cooling break, the striker was sent out on a run but should’ve released the ball to Kalulu earlier, but kept it and was cynically dragged down from behind by Troilo.

The good news was that, despite the 1-0 lead, Parma hadn’t mustered up any sort of response beyond that initial attempt. Juve were the ones in control and pressing to find a second to put it away. González fired a whisker wide on a free kick with seven minutes left, but a few minutes later Cambiaso went to the ground grabbing at his ankle, and Koopmeiners came on to replace him. With two minutes left González won the ball deep from Abdou-Salam Konate. Kolo Muani and Locatelli played a one-two before the captain played in Koopmeiners. He whipped a ball through Troilo’s legs and into the far bottom corner, inch-perfect inside the post for his first Serie A goal since April 12 … 2025.

Luiz had one final attempt in stoppage time that went right at Corvi, and soon the final whistle blew to send the fans home happy, with the team’s first big test looming on the horizon.

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