{"id":40827,"date":"2026-02-18T15:04:27","date_gmt":"2026-02-18T15:04:27","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/?p=40827"},"modified":"2026-02-18T15:04:27","modified_gmt":"2026-02-18T15:04:27","slug":"galatasaray-thrash-10-man-juve-in-ucl-play-off-1st-leg","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/?p=40827","title":{"rendered":"Galatasaray thrash 10-man Juve in UCL play-off 1st leg"},"content":{"rendered":"
Dutch midfielder Noa Lang scored a brace as Galatasaray thumped Juventus 5-2 in a pulsating contest in Istanbul on Tuesday in the first leg of a Champions League playoff.<\/p>\n

In a nerve-shredding atmosphere, Luciano Spalletti’s Juventus actually led 2-1 at half-time after Teun Koopmeiners replied to Brazilian midfielder Gabriel Sara’s opener with a brace of his own.<\/p>\n

But Colombian full-back Juan Cabal was dismissed for two bookings in a calamitous second half as Lang’s brace and goals from Davinson Sanchez and Sacha Boey sunk the Old Lady, who faced a miserable return to Turin.<\/p>\n

“We took several steps backwards,” moaned Spalletti, whose team had been rejuvenated since he took over in late October with Juve seventh in Serie A and languishing outside the play-off spots in the Champions League after failing to win any of their first three matches.<\/p>\n

“We finished the first half badly, we tried to sort things out but we lacked personality and character,” added the 66-year-old.<\/p>\n

“Obviously the sending off weighed heavily on us, but we also played our part… We didn’t realise the danger in what we were doing.”<\/p>\n

This was Juve’s joint-second heaviest defeat in European competition, after their 7-0 humbling by Wiener Sport-Club, who currently play in Austria’s regional leagues, back in 1958.<\/p>\n

Sara opened the scoring with a slick left-footed strike from just inside the box on 15 minutes, but that lead was short-lived.<\/p>\n

Gala goalkeeper Ugurcan Cakir could only parry Khephren Thuram’s powerful header into the path of the onrushing Koopmeiners, who tapped in the leveller just a minute later.<\/p>\n

Koopmeiners then picked out the top corner from the edge of the box on 32 minutes after a clever exchange with US midfielder Weston McKennie.<\/p>\n

That was as good as it got for the visitors, though.<\/p>\n

Okan Buruk’s Turkish champions ran riot after the break as Lang pounced on a loose ball in the six-yard box to level on 49 minutes.<\/p>\n

Sanchez nodded Gala ahead on the hour mark as the home fans ramped up the volume.<\/p>\n

Juve complained of an unfair dismissal in their 3-2 defeat to Serie A leaders Inter Milan at the weekend, but they could have no issues with Cabal’s sending off on 67 minutes.<\/p>\n

Lang bagged his brace shortly afterwards as he pounced on the loose ball after Victor Osimhen robbed English centre-back Lloyd Kelly from Thuram’s poor pass inside his own box.<\/p>\n

Substitute Boey ensured Gala would take a commanding lead to Turin next week as he lashed home from an angle five minutes from time.<\/p><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Dutch midfielder Noa Lang scored a brace as Galatasaray thumped Juventus 5-2 in a pulsating contest in Istanbul on Tuesday in the first leg of a Champions League playoff. In a nerve-shredding atmosphere, Luciano Spalletti’s Juventus actually led 2-1 at half-time after Teun Koopmeiners replied to Brazilian midfielder Gabriel Sara’s opener with a brace of […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-40827","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-english-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/40827","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=40827"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/40827\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=40827"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=40827"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=40827"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}