Juventus continue their reign in Serie A after picking up an important 2-0 victory over newly promoted side, Novara, with goals from Simone Pepe and also Fabio Quagliarela, who netted his first ever goal since December 2010.
The Turin giant’s success in leading the table on their own this weekend also happened due to Udinese’s failure in picking up three points against Lazio, forcing Francesco Guidolin’s team slipping into third position giving Ac Milan a spot at second place.
Playing in an important match against Lazio, Guidolin surprisingly rested their goal machine, Antonio Di Natale and went for Antonio Floro Flores’ partnership along with young Romanian, Gabriel Torje. The duet worked out pretty well in the first half as they took the lead through Floro Flores’ header, which came from Torje’s fine assist, but the domination swung the other way after the Biancocelesti equalized from Senad Lulic’s long range screamer.
Lazio played much better in the second half and took the lead through Miroslav Klose, forcing Guidolin to finally fielded Di Natale, which paid off as the veteran bomber provided an assist for Udinese’s Equalizer scored by Giampiero Pinzi. Meanwhile, in San Siro, goals from Antonio Nocerino and Zlatan Ibrahimovic’s penalty kick were more than enough to put Milan tailing Juventus and still hoping to steal the table topper before the Christmas break.
Inter Milan also managed to keep their positiver run going after picking up another victory on the weekend, this time Andrea Rannochia, emerged as the Nerazzurri’s savior with a fine header that stole all three points from Cesena. A surprise occurred at San Paolo though, where home team, Napoli, were beaten by As Roma 3-1, luck apparently wasn’t on Walter Mazzarri’s side on that match as they only managed to score a goal through Marek Hamsik despite creating plenty wonderful chances.
However, Luis Enrique was obviously feeling ecstatic with the important victory and didn’t really have any problem in admitting the luck that his team had with goals from Aronica’s own goal, Pablo Osvaldo and a deflected Simplicio’s effort. The competition will continue this midweek and several changes could happened in the last game before the winter break, especially at the top since there will be a big match clash at the top between Juve against Udinese.
photo credit: _bianconero
