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DARKO KOVACEVIC: A PLAYER FOR JUVENTUS' CHAMPIONSHIP It is more and more a football full of debates, doubts and disputes. Because of this, the silence followed by facts is certainly more effective than hundreds vaunted protests. The match of last Sunday probably sanctioned Juventus as the next winner of the championship. Thanks to Juventus' victory at San Siro over Inter, while Lazio only drew with Fiorentina in Florence, the team trained by Ancelotti has now a five-point lead on its follower, and this when there are only four matches before the end of the championship. It is now very unlikely that Juventus will lose precious points at the final rush, mainly after having played away for two consecutive times without losing. Indeed, its success at the Meazza stadium repeats the victory of the previous weekend in Bologna. The "Old Lady" of the Italian football has virtually grabbed again the shield in its matches away, whereas most predicted it would fail. On the contrary, after the two consecutive defeats with Milan and Lazio, with Lazio following it at only three points, Juventus has managed to recover with a great reaction and to shake off all its fears for a championship it already seemed to have won.  Beyond the certain merits of Ancelotti and the team the Emilian coach was able to set up, we should also talk of another man, a player who everybody in Turin now consider to be providential. This role was once played by Filippo Inzaghi or by Zidane, for their ability to drive the team during the most negative moments. And Del Piero, too, despite he seems no longer able to score, has always been implacable in scoring from a penalty. Currently the Juventus hero is Darko Kovacevic, the powerful Serbian centre forward who in the last two successful matches had the great merit to score 3 goals out of a total of 4. In particular, thanks to his two goals in the match with Inter, Juventus has virtually gained his 26th shield. Until now, this good forward has played very little in this championship, due to evident problems of team organization. In fact, due to the fact that Inzaghi was in excellent form and that Del Piero had to recover, mainly from a psychological viewpoint, from a bad accident, the trainer was often forced to leave out Darko from the team. Therefore the centre forward coming from Real Sociedad regularly played only in the Uefa Cup. As for the rest, he usually remained on the bench and sometimes he was made to play in the place of Inzaghi, who most times did not agree with Ancelotti's choices. The day before the match with Inter, Kovacevic in an interview told that during the championship he had hoped he would have played more frequently, given his good performance. Indeed, all the times that he played, mainly for the Uefa Cup, he always made an impressing number of goals, and thus leaving him on the bench really seemed a wrong choice, given his extraordinary ability in scoring.  But this player should mainly be exalted for the fact that he never complained and he was always ready to remain on the bench even when everybody did not understand why he was left out of the team. Darko has always been a professional, always accepting to play whenever he was required, and then always scoring decisive goals for Juventus. He never complained, nor he stepped out of line. To continue to play: this is his motto. It is a behaviour that has made him to become greatly appreciated by Ancelotti, and mainly by his teammates. Let's see for example the way his teammates congratulate him even when he scores a goal that is not decisive (even though that rarely happens). Juventus supporters in particular cannot have missed it: for example, when Inzaghi scored a goal against Rome he was not even hugged, even though this was maybe one of the most decisive goals of this championship. On the other hand, when Kovacevik scored the third goal for Juventus against Milan at the Delle Alpi stadium (an unimportant goal) he even risked of being suffocated by his teammates who embraced him. If in people's imagination a protagonist is usually chosen according to a single agonistic event, particularly a goal, in the imagination of players he is selected looking at the many facts of a life in common made of training camps, trainings and away matches. Currently, at Juventus, the Serbian player is undoubtedly greatly appreciated by everybody, including managers. Moreover the press has always talked of him only for his agonistic exploits. He is therefore the ideal champion, even though he is often relegated to a secondary role. However, once Juventus wins its 26th shield, he will certainly be able to boast the merits and a way of life that are greatly appreciated by real football lovers. Paolo Ghisoni

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