Juventus pulled further clear at the top of Serie A on Monday evening with a textbook 2-0 win against Bologna at the Stadio Renato Dall’Ara.
After a scoreless draw in their first game back and subsequent defeat in the Coppa Italia final the Old Lady were keen to hit the ground running in Serie A and they did exactly that by extending the gap between themselves and Lazio ahead of the Biancocelesti’s trip to take on Atalanta on Wednesday.
Just as was the case in last Wednesday’s defeat against Napoli, Maurizio Sarri’s side dominated the possession stats but didn’t carve out too many chances.
The breakthrough came midway through the first half from the penalty spot thanks to Cristiano Ronaldo, but the spot kick was only awarded after VAR had intervened.
Stefano Denswil had dragged Matthijs de Ligt to ground in the box, leading to the penalty being awarded.
De Ligt was again involved in the attack as Juventus made it two. The Dutchman stepped into midfield and fed the ball into Federico Bernardeschi who, in turn, flicked the ball on to Paulo Dybala.
The Argentine turned slickly and found a yard of space from where he was able to pick out the top corner of Lukasz Skorupski’s goal.
Dybala could have had his second and Juventus’ third when Juan Cuadrado picked him out at the back post but his volley was off target.
The Portuguese No.7 should have made it 3-0 after half time when he found himself one-on-one with Skorupski. With the Pole fast approaching, though, the forward rushed his effort and poked off target.
Bernardeschi then came close to his own fine strike, smacking the post with a driven shot from the edge of the area, though replays showed Skorupski to have gotten a finger to it.
Bologna wanted their own penalty when Musa Barrow was caught late by Mattia De Sciglio but, even after VAR was referred to, no penalty was given.
Danilo, despite coming off the bench for Mattia De Sciglio late on, picked up two foolish yellow cards to leave Sarri potentially without any fit left-backs for.
