AFP, Milan :
Juventus escaped Salernitana with a hard-fought 2-0 win on Tuesday which brought some positivity after a difficult week, while Atalanta are on the heels of Serie A’s leaders following a Mario Pasalic-inspired 4-0 win over Venezia.
Paulo Dybala and Alvaro Morata struck the goals which gave struggling Juve the points at the Stadio Arechi but they stay seventh, seven points behind Atalanta who sit fourth in the final Champions League spot.
“Right now more than ever we need a sense of responsibility. We don’t need to do anything out of the ordinary, we need to do the normal things but with intelligence… today we did that,” said Giorgio Chiellini to DAZN.
Dybala lashed home the opener in the 21st minute after a neat one-two with Dejan Kulusevski and 10 minutes later Juve thought they had doubled their lead through captain Chiellini.
However after the veteran defender had celebrated pushing home the rebound following Juan Cuadrado’s free-kick thwacking the post, the goal was ruled out by VAR officials who spotted Moise Kean straying fractionally offside as the Colombian struck his shot.
From there Juventus dominated proceedings but could count themselves very lucky not to enter the final half an hour level with their promoted opponents when, after a confused Juve defence allowed a cross to wriggle out to Luca Ranieri, the 22-year-old could only fire onto the post from close range.
And with 20 minutes remaining Morata made sure of the points for the away side with a deft flick after Federico Bernardeschi’s deflected cross fizzed into him.
Dybala then skied a stoppage-time penalty and wasted an opportunity to make the scoreline more emphatic, but few in black and white will care after two embarrassing defeats to Chelsea and Atalanta and a criminal investigation into club accounts and transfer dealings.
Pasalic hit a hat-trick as Atalanta continued their superb recent run of form in Bergamo to move within four points of league leaders Napoli, who face Sassuolo on Wednesday.
After an impressive win at Juve at the weekend, Atalanta won their fourth straight league match thanks to Pasalic’s treble and a Teun Koopmeiners strike which puts them level on 31 points with Inter Milan in third.
