Gianluca Scamacca sinks Cagliari, Atalanta returns to success
Saturday’s Serie A Week 15 ended with Atalanta’s 2-1 victory over Cagliari. The Dea, fresh from the feat with World champions Chelsea, thus returned to victory, forgetting the ugly knockout in Verona. At the New Balance Arena, the man of the match was Scamacca, who unblocked the score at 11′ by heel and closed the score da robber d’area at’81’. In between for the Sardinians was the momentary equalizer by Gaetano, who scored at 75′ after a great play and on an assist from Sebastiano Esposito. Dea thanks to this success thus moved to 19 points, leaving Pisacane’s Cagliari at 14.
Earlier, Despite two direct expulsions, one in the first and one in the second half and both on 0-0, Lazio returned from Parma with three more points in the standings: the goal scored by Noslin in the 82nd minute was in fact decisive for the biancoceleste success, the first in the league since last November 23. Intense match since the first minutes, with the two goalkeepers, Corvi for Parma and Provedel for Lazio, often engaged by the opponents’ attackers. At 42′ Maurizio Sarri’s team remains in ten: bad intervention of the biancoceleste on Estevez, the referee Marchetti has no doubts and directly draws the red card. In the second half, which was more nervous and with less interesting actions on both sides, it was again Estevez who caused the second red card, at 78′: in fact, the match director noticed a push by the Argentine on Basic, who reacted in a showy manner, thus deciding to caution the Parma player and expel the Lazio one. Nevertheless, at 82’82’ came the guest goal: a sudden verticalization in the direction of Noslin caught the Gialloblù defense off guard, which let slip the Dutch striker, who was good at jumping Corvi and depositing in the net. In shock, the Gialloblù tried everything: Provedel was good on Estevez at the 83’83’, Djuric was inaccurate with a header at the 96′. It ends 0-1, for Lazio it’s a feat worth the rapprochement to the Europa Zone.
After three consecutive defeats and six games in a row without victories, Torino returned to winning ways and did so by beating one of the most in-form teams since the beginning of December, Cremonese: at the Olimpico Grande Torino it ended 1-0 for the granata, dragged along by Nikola Vlasic’s goal in the first half. For the grigiorossi it is the first stop after the successes against Bologna and Lecce.
The goal that decided the match came in the 27th minute of the first half: Zapata tried to control the ball in the area and the Colombian’s touch turned into an assist for Vlasic, whose first-intention right-footed conclusion left Audero no chance. For Vlasic it is the fourth goal of the season with Toro (one in the Coppa Italia, three in the league). Cremonese did not lack opportunities to equalize: most notable was Moumbagna’s attempt from a very good position at the 80’s: subbing in for Bonazzoli three minutes earlier, the Cameroonian shot high, thus wasting the opportunity to equalize and continue the positive series that began with the success in Bologna.
