Benfica travelled to Turin with their place in the knockout rounds not yet secured after they snatched defeat from the jaws of victory on matchday seven, giving up a two-goal lead on two occasions as they fell to a 5-4 defeat to Barcelona.
Vangelis Pavlidis netted a first-half hat-trick in the nine-goal thriller, and while he was unable to match those heights in Turin, he still celebrated a crucial opener in the 17th minute at the Allianz Stadium. The Greek striker had the simple task of rolling the ball home after being teed up by centre-back Alexander Bah.
Matters nearly got worse for Juventus when they carelessly gave the ball away in first-half stoppage time, with Mattia Perin required to make a crucial stop to keep the Benfica marksman at bay.
With Juventus trailing at half-time for the first time in a UCL home game this season, Khephren Thuram attempted to lead the home side’s response, forcing Anatoliy Trubin to dive to his left to gather his driven effort.
However, the hosts followed that moment of promise with ineffective spells of possession rather than creating a flow of clearcut chances, highlighting why they have failed to trouble the scorers in three of their last five European outings.
When Trubin was eventually forced back into action, it was to prevent Nicolas Otamendi from inadvertently putting the ball into his own net from Weston McKennie’s inswinging cross.
While Juventus lacked a real cutting edge, Benfica had no such trouble, doubling their advantage in the 81st minute to end the home side’s hopes of salvaging a positive result. Orkun Kokcu collected Pavlidis’ pass on the edge of the box, before sweeping a low right-foot shot past the outstretched Perrin.
That strike wrapped up a third win in four European away games, securing Benfica a 16th-place finish and leaving Juventus to settle for 20th position.