Former Juventus defender Mark Iuliano has revealed how ex-teammate Paolo Montero once went into Arsenal’s dressing room to fight with the Gunners team.
The defender turned manager recently appeared on Christian Vieiri’s Twitch channel to discuss his career, and one of his memories involved a clash with Arsenal.
Iuliano spent nine years with Juventus after joining them from Salernitana in 1996, making 277 appearances for the club in all competitions before departing in 2005.
One big game saw his side take on Arsenal in the quarterfinals of the Champions League in 2005/2006, which they lost 2-0 thanks to goals from Cesc Fabregas and Thierry Henry.
It was an ill-tempered evening for the Italians, who ended the game with nine men thanks to late red cards for Mauro Camoranesi and Jonathan Zebina.
One particular moment appeared to have angered Paolo Montero, who even headed to the Arsenal dressing room to make his feelings clear according to Iuliano.
“He and I were quite quarrelsome, both before and after the match. If you argued, you argued,” Area Napoli report him saying.
“We play against Arsenal with Campbell, Vieira etc. We lose 2-0 and Henry scores. Someone made a bad challenge on Zalayeta, it was a tough match.
“At the end of the match, it wasn’t over for Montero. He entered the Arsenal changing rooms, we’re talking about very bad players. Nobody noticed. We hear ‘pum, pum, pum…’
“Montero returns and slams the door and tells us: ‘you sent me alone! And you, Pessotto, where were you?’
“Davids, myself etc. were there, we were all big and he says ‘you Pessotto, where were you? you sent yourself to the Arsenal dressing room!’. Pessotto said to him: ‘but Paolo, what should I do?’. It was genius and recklessness.”
