Turin falls silent

Milan basks in Champions League triumph

MILAN/TURIN (Reuters) -- The city of Milan burst into spontaneous celebration after AC Milan won a dramatic Champions League final penalty shootout on Wednesday while a shroud of silence fell over Turin, home town of losing finalists Juventus.

Fans in both cities had crowded around huge screens and crammed into bars to watch the first all-Italian Champions League final but had to sit through more than two hours of goalless football before Milan triumphed 3-2 on spot kicks.

"I watched two dreadful halves, 30 minutes of nail-biting extra time and in one second of a nightmare shootout, my world has crashed around me," said Juventus fan Tomaso Rossi, who watched the match in Turin's central Piazza Castello.

But 140 km (88 miles) down the road, Milan fans forgot how they had clutched their temples every time Juventus attacked and predicted a golden era for their club, owned by Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi.

"We're six-times European champions. Now we're going to win the World Championship, Serie A and the European Cup again. Nobody can stop us," cried Riccardo Battaglia, hanging out of one of the hundreds of cars in a huge traffic jam.

Other fans decked Italy's financial capital in Milan's red and black flags and fired bright red flares into the balmy evening air.

Flocks of the 30,000 people who watched the match on a giant screen in Milan's San Siro stadium hugged each other on the metro trains home.

"This was judgement day for Juve -- they can't win forever," beamed 27-year-old Tarek, waving a blue and yellow Ukrainian flag in honor of Milan striker Andriy Shevchenko, who scored the decisive penalty at Manchester's Old Trafford stadium.

In Turin, groups of grown men collapsed on the side of the street, weeping quietly on each other's shoulders.

Others kicked despondently through the sea of empty bottles in Piazza Castello, blaming the loss on a weakened midfield that missed the influence of a suspended Pavel Nedved.

"We played so well against Real Madrid in the semifinals but without Nedved they were like a bunch of teenagers. I can't bear it," said Geli Odobashi, an Albanian immigrant who said his job in life was to cheer on the recently-crowned Serie A champions.

 

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