Gianluca Vialli believes Juventus deserve to win the Champions League – “if you keep knocking on the same door, eventually you’ll open it”.
The former striker won the trophy with the Bianconeri in 1996, but they’ve lost five finals in a row since then, including in Cardiff in June.
“There are at least eight teams that can win this time,” Vialli told UEFA’s official website.
Gianluca Vialli believes Juventus deserve to win the Champions League – “if you keep knocking on the same door, eventually you’ll open it”.
The former striker won the trophy with the Bianconeri in 1996, but they’ve lost five finals in a row since then, including in Cardiff in June.
“There are at least eight teams that can win this time,” Vialli told UEFA’s official website.
“I wouldn’t be surprised by any one of [Manchester] City, [Manchester] United, Juventus, Chelsea, Bayern Munich, Barcelona, Real Madrid and Paris Saint-Germain, they’re all on very high levels.
“Chelsea have a very difficult group with Roma and Atletico Madrid, so they’ll have to take it one step at a time.
“First they’ll need to get through the group, then we’ll see what happens with the draw and in the Premier League, where there’s a competitiveness which will drain a lot from Antonio [Conte]’s team.
“Juve are trying to release pressure, nobody is talking explicitly about the Champions League and that means they’re quietly trying to aim for it.
“It’s a very clever way to approach the competition, especially after losing two finals in three years.
“Can they win it? I hope so, yes. It would be time. And I think Juve deserve it after losing seven finals. If you keep knocking on the same door, sooner or later you’ll open it.
“Football has changed [since 1996] but I believe Juve can win it. We were a solid and effective team, my wish is that today’s Juve can do that too.”
Vialli also lost a final to Barcelona in this competition, and he reflected on that and some other moments of his career.
“We met a very strong team, but they’d never won the Champions League, a surprising fact given what that badge means.
“We weren’t favourites, and three days before we’d played a game against Fiorentina that we had to win to qualify for the UEFA Cup.
“I’d almost been sold to Juventus, so both physically and psychologically we weren’t in the best condition – or at least I wasn’t.
“The match was beautiful, it was balanced with chances for both sides. In fact I missed two, maybe that’s why we didn’t win!
“The best player I played with? I was lucky enough to play with [Roberto] Mancini, [Roberto] Baggio, [Alessandro] Del Piero, [Gianfranco] Zola… all number 10s of a certain class who allowed me to score a lot of goals.
“Then I also played with [Paolo] Maldini and [Franco] Baresi, with goalkeeper like [Gianluca] Pagliuca, [Walter] Zenga, [Angelo] Peruzzi… I was very lucky.
“As for opponents, in my time in Italy there was Zico, [Diego] Maradona, [Michel] Platini, Falcao…
“Who would I like to play with today? [Paulo] Dybala, but also [Andrea] Belotti. In England I really like Gabriel Jesus.
“He’s creating a great partnership with [Sergio] Aguero. He’s elegant, young, calm, and technically good.
“Then of course he can only improve with [Pep] Guardiola. There’s more to come from him.”