Coppa Italia Semifinals: Juventus Beat Milan, Napoli Victorious Over Siena

Napoli Vs. Siena, 2012 Coppa Italia: Siena Hand Napoli A Trip To The Final

Napoli are through to the final of the Coppa Italia for the first time in fifteen years, beating lowly Siena with a bit of help from Own Goal. The partenopei went into the second leg at the San Paolo trailing 2-1, clutching at their crucial away goal, knocked in by Siena defender Emanuele Pesoli. But the robur took pains to help them out again, and Napoli came away with a 2-0 win for the leg, and a 3-2 aggregate victory.

It was likely never a fair fight for Siena. After last week's exit from Champions League football, Walter Mazzarri showed little hesitation in fielding a full-strength lineup, but the visitors were missing many of their first-choice players due to injury. But apparently Giuseppe Sannino never learned from the mistakes of others, and elected to field a 5-3-2 in hopes of stopping the free-flowing Napoli.

Instead, the defensive system crumbled, with Simone Vergassola the one to take the heat, deflecting the ball into his own net in the 11th minute. Then, as if to prove the point that you just can't stop a Napoli counter-attack, the trident sprinted up the pitch, sending the ball from Edinson Cavani to Ezequiel Lavezzi to Marek Hamsik, who returned it back to El Matador for him to head it into the net.

Despite plenty of chances in the second half, the home side failed to increase their tally. In the end, though, the generous help from Own Goal was enough to see Napoli through to the final. They will face Juventus at the Stadio Olimpico on May 20.

Juventus Vs. AC Milan, 2012 Coppa Italia: Juve Through To Final After Thriller

Juventus are through to the Coppa Italia final after a thrilling encounter with league-leading AC Milan in Turin, drawing 2-2 on the night and advancing 4-3 on the aggregate. With the hosts holding a 2-1 lead from the first leg, you might have expected this to be a fairly easy affair, and it certainly looked as though things were heading that way when Alessandro del Piero rounded Marco Amelia to open the scoring in the 28th minute.

But Milan fought back, playing much better football in the second half after withdrawing Zlatan Ibrahimovic, who had rather given the impression that he simply could not care less about a Coppa match. Much-maligned fullback Djemel Mesbah pulled the Rossoneri back to within one with a lovely diving header that fizzed past Marco Storari and in, and substitute Maxi Lopez evened things up on aggregate with a phenomenal late effort, dancing through the heart of Juventus' back line before lashing into the top corner to bring the match to extra time.

After all of the effort it took to get to extras, however, Milan failed to turn up for seconds. They looked done out of the blocks, and it came as no surprise when Mirko Vucinic made it 2-2 (4-3) to Juve in the 95th minute. Ok, maybe it came as a bit of a surprise, considering that the Montenegrin forward managed to absolutely bury a shot from 30 yards with zero apparent effort. From then on, the match looked pretty safe. Milan were out of ideas, and Juventus weren't overly troubled for the remainder of extra time.

Coppa Italia 2012, Semifinals Second Legs: Juventus, Siena In Control Heading To Final 90 Minutes

AC Milan look dead as they head to Juventus, but Napoli has a chance to mount a comeback against Siena.