Thaindian News

Rome, Nov 27 (IANS) Juventus extended their unbeaten streak in the Italian Serie A football with a 1-0 win at Lazio.

The visitors scored the sole goal of the match through Simone Pepe in the 34th minute in a fast counter-attack. The result allowed Antonio Conte’s Juve to leapfrog Udinese into first place with a game in hand.

Antonio Conte, head coach of Juventus, cut a content figure after the game.

“I am happy, as it was not an easy match and we won a top of the table clash,” he was quoted as saying by Xinhua.

“As far as we are concerned, this performance is an important sign of our maturity. We suffered under pressure too, but that is inevitable at the Olimpico and we never stopped looking for the second goal,” he said.

Lazio head coach Edy Reja was enraged as he accused the referee failed to show a red card and award a penalty in favor of his side.

An incident occurred in the first half, when Tommaso Rocchi’s chip over a beaten Gigi Buffon took a deflection off Andrea Barzagli’s hand to go off target.

“We were unlucky with the incidents, as there was a clear penalty on Rocchi’s shot and Barzagli should have been sent off,” Reja said.

“Had that been spotted, it was a spot-kick and a straight red card, in my view. Unfortunately, it proved to be decisive. Maybe the referee just didn’t see it, but his decision was very disappointing,” he said.

Edinson Cavani grabbed a last-gasp equaliser as Napoli salvaged a 1-1 draw from their trip to Atalanta.

It looked like former Napoli striker German Denis was going to punish his former employers with his goal in the 64th minute, but Cavani struck deep into stoppage time to salvage a rather fortunate point for Walter Mazzarri’s men.

Atalanta only have themselves to blame for wasting some good chances when they were on top of the game before Napoli’s late rally.

Novara came from behind to win their second Serie A match of the season as they beat Parma 2-1.

Novara defender Matteo Centurioni scored an own goal in the 29th minute but headers from Raffaele Rubino and Marco Rigoni turned the game around and lifted the Piedmontese side out of the bottom three.

Pablo Barrientos’ 90th-minute score snatched a dramatic 1-0 win for Catania over Lecce.