MILAN: A first-half header from Juan Cuadrado delivered a 1-0 win for a jittery Juventus at Sampdoria on Sunday to provisionally extend their lead in Serie A and take a step closer to a sixth successive Scudetto, while Napoli kept alive their faint title hopes with a 3-2 win at Empoli.

Juve moved up to 73 points with nine games to play when Cuadrado, making his 50th appearance for the reigning champions, met Kwadwo Asamoah’s excellent cross from the left in the seventh minute with a diving header to give Massimiliano Allegri’s relentless league leaders an early lead.

Sampdoria came out battling after the break, and came close to equalising when the outstanding Asamoah was forced to deny Patrik Schnick with an exceptional last-gasp interception, but Juve defended stoutly to see out the win.

Earlier, Napoli consolidated their grip on the Champions League places and moved 10 points behind Juve and provisionally one clear of AS Roma into second on 63 points with an exhilarating win at Empoli.

Dries Mertens, who had missed an early penalty, netted his 20th league goal this season and Lorenzo Insigne scored twice to give Napoli a commanding lead before Empoli hit back through former Napoli player Omar El Kaddouri and Massimo Maccarone.

“We’re growing, but a team that plays a second half like this cannot have strong ambitions,” Sarri told journalists. “Until we resolve this problem, we cannot bridge the gap with the top teams.”

Lazio’s five-match winning run came to an end as they were held to a goalless draw at Cagliari to dent its hopes of sneaking into the Champions League, slipping five points behind Roma.

Alejandro Gomez’s double and a goal from Alberto Grassi saw Atalanta bounce back from last weekend’s 7-1 humbling at Inter Milan and beat Pescara 3-0 to move back up to sixth on 55 points.

Inter, held 2-2 at Torino on Saturday, sit fifth on the same points as Atalanta, while AC Milan made ground on their neighbours, beating Genoa 1-0.

Antonio Candreva’s equaliser rescued Inter, slamming the ball into an empty net in the 62nd minute after a glaring error from Joe Hart, who failed to claim Cristian Ansaldi’s pinpoint cross.

Afriyie Acquah had given Torino the lead after Daniele Baselli had cancelled out Geoffrey Kondogbia’s fine solo opener before the break.

Milan closed to within two points with a precious win over Genoa at the San Siro, where Chile forward Mati Fernandez hit his maiden goal on his maiden appearance.

Published in Dawn, March 20th, 2017