Alessandro Del Piero says his A-League All Stars will find it difficult to upset Italian football champions Juventus on Sunday in a "strange" clash against his former club.
Del Piero, 39, is likely to play his final game in Australia in the ANZ Stadium fixture after spending the past two seasons with A-League side Sydney FC.
Prior to that stint, he starred for Juve over 19 seasons and caught up with some of the current team at a dinner in Sydney on Friday night.
"It is a strange feeling for sure, but until the moment I stand across from my former teammates in the tunnel, I don't now what will happen," All Stars captain Del Piero said on Saturday.
Juventus have a glittering cast of internationals including Italian icons Gianluigi Buffon and Andrea Pirlo and a host of foreign talent such as Frenchmen Paul Pogba and Patrice Evra and Argentinian Carlos Tevez.
Del Piero recalled previously scoring at least one goal against Buffon from a penalty when the goalkeeper played for Parma before joining him at Juventus.
New Juventus coach Massimiliano Allegri and Evra, who played in Manchester United's 5-1 win over the All Stars in Sydney last year, have warned their team to expect a much tougher game than their 8-1 rout of an Indonesian select side last Wednesday.
"Obviously Australian soccer has improved significantly in the last (few) years," Allegri said.
All Stars coach Josep Gombau said all of his squad would play at some stage and while he had settled on his starting side, he didn't want to release it publicly.
Del Piero had no illusions about the extent of the task the All Stars faced.
"It's very hard because at the end of the day, they are better than us because they (have) played with each other for a long time," Del Piero said.
"We're a selection and we spend only one week with Josep. He shows us everything we have to do in the game, but one week is very short to have the right combination for good confidence in each other."
Renowned for his positive approach at Adelaide, Spaniard Gombau stressed the All Stars would embrace that style and not just "park the bus" outside their penalty area.
"For us, it's a challenge - we need to try to show around the world that the A-League is a good league," Gombau said.
"...that the level of our football here is great and you can show it in games like this.
"We don't have the opportunity to play against European teams every week, we just play them once a year and it's a great opportunity to try and show that there are good players and good coaches."
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