Napoli stutter against lowly Lecce; Juventus stunned despite Ronaldo record

Relegation-battling Lecce halted Napoli’s revival with a shock 3-2 win at the Stadio San Paolo on Sunday, their first Serie A victory at the venue since 1998.

Gianluca Lapadula put the visitors in front against the run of play after half an hour, but Napoli pulled level early in the second half through Arkadiusz Milik.

Gennaro Gattuso’s side were left stunned when Lapadula struck again with a header before Marco Mancosu whipped a stunning free kick into the top corner, and Jose Callejon’s 90th-minute bicycle kick was too little too late.

 The result ended a run of three consecutive wins for Napoli in all competitions and left the hosts in 11th place with 30 points, eight ahead of Lecce.

Elsewhere, Diego Lopez was denied a win on his debut as Brescia coach after a stoppage-time equaliser from Udinese’s Rodrigo De Paul cancelled out Dimitri Bisoli’s opener to earn the visitors a 1-1 draw.

Genoa secured only their fourth win of the season with a 1-0 victory against Cagliari, Goran Pandev’s first-half strike stretching the visitors’ winless league run to nine matches.

Sassuolo came from behind to beat bottom side SPAL 2-1, a Francesco Caputo penalty and last-minute Jeremie Boga header responding to Kevin Bonifazi’s first-half opener for SPAL.

Meanwhile, Cristiano Ronaldo on Saturday became the first Juventus player to score in 10 successive Serie A games but the champions fell 2-1 at Hellas Verona to leave an opening to their title rivals.

Ronaldo broke through after 65 minutes, to hit his 15th goal in 10 games and take his league tally to 20.

The five-time Ballon d’Or winner is closing in on the all-time Serie A record of scoring in 11 consecutive games held by Gabriel Batistuta and Fabio Quagliarella.

But Juventus paid for defensive errors with Fabio Borini pulling Verona level with quarter of an hour to go, before veteran striker Giampaolo Pazzini won the match for the promoted side from the penalty spot four minutes from time following a Leonardo Bonucci handball.

Lazio are four points behind the leaders in third before they travel to Parma. The defeat was the third this season for Maurizio Sarri’s side but second in three games after losing 2-1 at Napoli just two weeks ago.

Verona meanwhile are up to sixth after extending their unbeaten run to eight games days after earning a creditable goalless draw at Lazio, who can pull to within a point of Juve with a win at Parma on Sunday.

Earlier Atalanta consolidated fourth place with a 2-1 win at Fiorentina that ended the Bergamo side’s 27-year away winless run against the Tuscan club.

Federico Chiesa’s scorcher just after half an hour gave mid-table Fiorentina hope of another win over Atalanta, whom they eliminated from the Italian Cup at their Stadio Artemio Franchi last month.

But Duvan Zapata tapped in four minutes after the break to level the scores before Ruslan Malinovsky came off the bench to seal victory with 18 minutes left, giving Atalanta their first win away at the ‘Viola’ since 1993.

Gian Piero Gasperini’s side pull three points clear of fifth-placed Roma in the race for the Champions League following the capital club’s 3-2 home defeat to Bologna on Friday, but are still eight points behind Lazio.

Atalanta host Roma next weekend before they play at home against Valencia in the Champions League last-16, having qualified for the competition for the first time this season.

Moreno Longo started his reign as Torino coach with a 3-1 home defeat to Sampdoria, with the struggling Genoa club’s goals coming in a nine-minute second-half spell. Torino, in 12th, have now lost four games in a row, conceding 16 goals.

Claudio Ranieri’s Sampdoria are now 16th, seven points clear of the relegation zone.

Agencies