UEFA Champions League | Lokomotiv Moscow 1-2 Juventus: 3 Talking Points
Juventus left it late to defeat Lokomotiv Moscow at the RZD Arena, with goals from Aaron Ramsey and Douglas Costa helping to render Aleksey Miranckuk's strike irrelevant.
Summer signing Ramsey had put the visitors ahead inside four minutes - becoming the first British player to score a Champions League goal for Juventus - reacting quickest after Guilherme could only parry Cristiano Ronaldo's freekick back into the danger area.
Less than 10 minutes later, the hosts were level, with Aleksey Mirachuk showing great reflexes to convert after his initial header had rebounded off the post.
From then on, the game turned into a tactical slugfest, with both teams sparring but not drawing blood.
Just when the game seemed destined to end as a stalemate, Douglas Costa combined well with Gonzalo Higuain, showing great footwork before slotting into the back of the net in the third minute of injury time.
The victory was no less than Maurizio Sarri would have expected and we shall be taking a look at three talking points from the early kickoff in Russia.
#3 Juventus seal qualification for the knockout rounds
Juventus are one of the elite teams in Europe and were seeded for the Champions League draw which pitted them with Atletico Madrid, Bayer Leverkusen, and Lokomotiv Moscow.
With all due respect to Lokomotiv and Bayer, but Atletico is the only significant threat to Juventus on paper and the Bianconerri would have expected to qualify from the group stage pretty easily.
So far, they have posted three victories from four matches, with their only setback unexpectedly coming at the Wanda Metropolitano where they drew 2-2 with Atletico Madrid.
Their latest victory over Lokomotiv takes them to 10 points at the top of the table.
With two matchdays to go, this is an ideal situation for Maurizio Sarri, as he could use the remaining group stage fixtures to rotate his squad and keep them fresh for a tight Serie A race with Inter Milan.
However, the 60-year-old would have one eye on the return leg against Atletico Madrid as the fixture could go a long way in determining who tops the group.
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