Del Piero questions Buffon criticism of referee Oliver

At half time Real Madrid coach Zinedine Zidane brought on Marco Asensio and Lucas Vasquez for Gareth Bale and Casemiro, potentially in an attempt to reduce the impact Juve’s wide players were having in the match.

“You can not ruin the dreams of a team”.

Buffon saw red after furiously protesting referee Michael Oliver’s decision to award Madrid a stoppage-time penalty, which Cristiano Ronaldo converted as the two-time defending champions prevailed 4-3 on aggregate despite a 3-1 defeat on Wednesday.

Ronaldo stepped up and smashed home the resulting penalty, sending Madrid through to the semis and Juve out, and ending Buffon’s career without the Champions League.

“The pulse increased, but I calmed down, and I knew I’d be decisive”.

The 40-year-old was sent off controversially after confronting referee Michael Oliver when the English referee gave a penalty to Los Blancos in the dying moments of the game.

“I don’t understand why we should refer to the first leg, that’s how football is and you analyse the moment, whether it’s nice or ugly”.

“It was a 10th of a penalty. a human being can not destroy dreams like that at the end of an extraordinary comeback on a dubious situation”, he told Mediaset Premium. He had to understand the degree of the disaster he was creating. Juventus president Andrea Agnelli said he could understand Buffon’s fury and called for the introduction of the use of VAR in the Champions League – it is already used in the Serie A in Italy. “The lads were marvellous and it was moving; we start again from here, with our heads high, very high”, he said. “We can’t allow these incidents to occur”.

“Between the first leg and this one, just about everything happened”.

The Italian side had a dream start, as they got on the scoreboard as early as the second minute, through another veteran, in Croatian striker, Mario Mandzukic.

“The referee tonight was in total chaos”.

He was part of the UEFA Champions League Trophy Tour that made one of its six global stops in Abidjan, the largest city in Cote d’Ivoire.

“We have to react quickly from this blow because we still have titles to play for”, he said.

Marco Materazzi can probably answer for the latter, but the stark truth is that Juve’s performance in the first leg reveals far more about where they now stand and the work they have left to do in order to end what is already a 22-year wait for the ultimate moment of glory.

“If he’s not fouled, Lucas scores”.