Corinthians 1 – 2 AS Roma

Corinthians 1 – 2 AS Roma

Arena Corinthians (48000)

GOAL SCORERS

DEFREL (16)

JADSON (30)

VIETTO (72)

Vietto celebrates as he scores the winning goal in the 2-1 win over Corinthians

We’re here in Brazil with 28,947 fans as the first round of the cup match will be played today. Corinthians play at home to AS Roma as both teams will be looking to go as far as they can into the cups. Corinthians won their last match against unmanaged Basel while AS Roma drew their last match against Monaco. This will be the first game for the Corinthians manager Georgi Georgiev and he will be looking for an upset.

With the incentive of winning the cup, Roma will want to go as far as they can in the cup. Fert said in his pre-match conference that his team will be looking to win this as they know this competition is very important. Vietto will be looking to fight for a first team spot and the cup matches provide an avenue for him to do that. New Corinthians manager Georgi decided to go with a 4-2-3-1(B) formation for this game. Surprisingly, no change was made from the starting line up that played Basel on Sunday.

Corinthians line up:

R Cassio (87)

C Fagner (88) M Hinteregger (88) S Sane (87) D Santos (87)

D Propper (88) W Khazri (88)

A Townsend (88) S Jadson (c) (88) F Kostic (88)

E Chupo-Moting (88)

AS Roma came into the match with a 4-3-3(B) formation with only Alisson and Gonalons remaining from the starting line up that drew with Monaco, but Gonalons plays as a defensive midfielder this time.

AS Roma line up:

B Alisson (89)

B Peres (89) H Moreno (89) F Fazio (89) L Castan (88)

M Golalons (c) (90)

R Karsdrop (87) L Pellegrini (87)

J Iturbe (88) G Defrel (88)

Vietto (89)

First Half:

The first half was started by Corinthians who decided to play the ball through the wings. As Khazri was running with the ball, Defrel mistimed his challenge and brought Khazri down. He received a yellow card. A minute later, Jadson was given a yellow card for tackling Vietto. Vietto used to the free kick to lift the ball over the wall but Cassio was there to make a good save. In the 8th minute, Alisson made an easy save to stop Khazri’s shot from going in. Sixteen minutes into the game, the first goal of the match came as AS Roma received a free kick, Vietto saw Defrel unmarked and crossed the ball to him. Defrel volleyed the ball into the top right corner of the goal post and scored. Five minutes later, an attack was started by the AS Roma, Castan saw the goal keeper coming off his line and tried to chip the keeper but Cassio made a good recovery to palm the ball away. A goal for Corinthians came as Pellegrini committed a foul and got a yellow card. Jadson took the free kick with the inside of his foot and scored as Alisson couldn’t get to that. The half time whistle blew with scores 1 – 1.

Second Half:

The second half was started by AS Roma as they decided to play a passing game. In the 57th minute Iturbe crossed the ball to Castan who volleyed the ball, but Cassio made a good save to deny a goal. In the 66th minute Choupo-Moting was through on goal but his shot went past Alisson and missed the target. Corinthians then got a corner so Jadson decided to cross the ball to Choupo-Moting but his header went wide. A second goal came for AS Roma in the 72nd minute as De Rossi passed the ball to Vietto and he was through on goal. Vietto kicked the ball through the legs of the keeper and scored. Two minutes later, Corinthians were down to 10 men as Chupo-Moting committed a foul. Nainggolan tried a curler with the free-kick but the ball dipped too late and went out. In the 79th minute, Vietto got another chance to score but the keeper got a foot to the shot. Two minutes later, De Rossi tried a shot, but it went wide. He then committed a foul as he tried to take the ball from a defender and received a yellow card. The full-time whistle was blown and AS Roma are through into the next round.

FULL TIME: Corinthians 1 – 2 AS Roma

MOTM: Lucianno Vietto

Post Match Conference:

Fert started the press conference by saying: “I’m very happy to win here today. Vietto showed why he should be in the starting line up today and the other players showed that they can do the job when called upon. The cup is a priority, so we’ll see how far we can go”. Vietto was also available to talk about scoring the winning goal, here’s what he had to say: “I’m very happy to have started today and got a goal and an assist. The cup matches are truly important so I’ll be giving my all when called upon. We play Shandong Leung in the next round and I look forward to it”.