Zidane backs Juve for Scudetto

Former Juventus superstar Zinedine Zidane, now with Real Madrid, has claimed Juve are still favourites for the Scudetto, despite defeat to Roma.

The French World Cup and Euro 2000 winner, speaking to 'Corriere dello Sport', said: "Juve are my favourites for this year's Scudetto. I say this with the heart but with my mind as well. They've gotten much stronger especially with Gianluigi Buffon, Lilian Thuram, Pavel Nedved, Marcelo Salas and with Alessandro Del Piero, who I'm sure will play a great season."

Zidane also stated that it is way too early to say how strong the teams really are: "How can you talk about the future? Say what's going to happen in the next months? The world of football is so crazy these days. How can you evaluate a team after only a month?"

He went on: "Juve lost to Roma, Real drew with Valladolid and lost to Las Palmas, so what? If we believe that everything we saw in September is true then it would mean that since we defeated Roma and drew with Valladolid, then Valladolid are stronger than the Italian Champions!"

"I don't for one minute believe that Juve are in a crisis. We at Real are in 14th place, so what should we say? On the other hand we have nine points out of nine in the Champions League, so it's really a matter of how you look at things."

He assured fans his former team would turn things around: "Up until two weeks ago everybody was saying that Juve had already won the title and now they're in a crisis? That's ridiculous because losing to the Italian Champions of As Roma really isn't a big deal and it's not such an incredible thing."

"I agree with my coach Vicente Del Bosque who says that there are still 99 points to earn in the Liga and anything can happen. The same goes for Italy where there are 89 points yet to be assigned.
"Let's stay calm. Marcello Lippi knows what he has to do and the road is still very very long."