Football
Ben Gladwell, Italy correspondent 7y

Juventus' Gianluigi Buffon targeting more trophies after Serie A title win

Juventus goalkeeper Gianluigi Buffon is looking forward to winning even more trophies after securing a sixth straight Serie A title and eighth Scudetto of his career.

A 3-0 win over Crotone on Sunday ensured Juve became the first Italian club to win the league in six consecutive seasons.

But Buffon, 39, is intent on making it seven next year as his hunger for silverware shows no sign of waning.

"The first word that comes into my head after every victory is 'tomorrow,'" Buffon wrote in La Stampa. "I'm proud of the trophies I have won and I feel I am a man of my time, but it is what I still have to look forward to which keeps me alive and constantly moving.

"I've had more than I desired from life. Certainly more than I have asked for. Faced with a new goal, having just reached another objective, I always have the awareness that I have given everything and the feeling that I have received -- if possible -- even more.

"It is an aftertaste of constant recognition of life which has forced me to be an incurable optimist and which pushes me always to go beyond: beyond myself, beyond the wins, beyond the limits."

Juve may have wrapped up the title with a game to spare but they could end the season as champions only by a point, should Roma win their final game and they lose theirs next weekend.

Buffon, therefore, dismissed the notion that Juve have no rivals in Italy, saying that it has been a difficult title to win this season.

"It's the thought of people who have never won anything who tend to belittle the efforts of those who succeed," he said. "In this sixth Scudetto, there was nothing to be taken for granted, nothing predictable and nothing certain. We were favourites, of course, because of what we have built over the past five seasons.

"But we started from zero again and challenged ourselves, fighting and winning. Nobody gifted us anything. Each of our opponents gave their utmost against us. Everybody was hoping we would fail, and this is normal. The best have always been the ones who people dislike the most. But I'm happy to be disliked and let people be envious of an achievement that this club, everybody within this club, have managed to build.

"Without everybody who works on and off the field who have enabled me to give my best, all of this would not have been possible. And the most incredible thing is that all of this is not over yet."

Buffon can still lift a third trophy this season, having also won the Coppa Italia, when Juve face Real Madrid in the Champions League final in Cardiff on June 3.

He has expressed his intention of quitting international football following next year's World Cup, which he hopes to win for the second time with Italy, although he has not set a date for his eventual retirement from the game.

In addition to the eight Serie A titles he has won, excluding the 2005 and 2006 titles taken off Juve for the Calciopoli scandal, Buffon has won four Coppa Italias, the Serie B title in 2007 and the UEFA Cup.

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