Juventus continued their slow creep into the Serie A title race on Saturday with a 1-0 win over Spezia which moved them to within five points of leaders Inter Milan.
Alvaro Morata scored for the first time since mid-January with 20 minutes on the clock at the Allianz Stadium in Turin to keep Juve on the heels of champions Inter, who hammered Salernitana 5-0 on Friday.
Juve could find themselves seven points from the summit as Napoli host AC Milan in Sunday’s late match, with both a point behind Inter ahead of one of the biggest matches of the season so far.
However, regardless of the result at the Stadio Diego Armando Maradona, Juve are applying pressure thanks to a run of 14 league matches without defeat stretching back to the end of November.
Coach Massimiliano Allegri has repeatedly insisted that Juve are not in the title race and Morata was equally evasive when asked about his team’s ambitions for the season.
“I’m of my own opinion which is to think about the next training session and the next match. We can’t think about it too much,” he told DAZN.
Sunday’s was a far from accomplished performance from a team missing a host of players including Paulo Dybala, Weston McKennie, Giorgio Chiellini, Leonardo Bonucci and Denis Zakaria.
Juve’s only goal came thanks to a dreadful error from Spezia goalkeeper Ivan Provedel, who hit a bad kick straight to Daniele Rugani.
The centre-back passed to Dusan Vlahovic, whose lay off to Manuel Locatelli was followed by a quick pass to Morata, who pushed a low finish under Provedel.
Spezia responded in the second half and had two great chances to level, with Emmanuel Gyasi heading a huge opportunity straight at Wojciech Szczesny five minutes after the break.
Szczesny then had to be at his best to stop Kevin Agudelo, the Poland keeper charging out of his goal with 10 minutes remaining to make sure the
Vlahovic’s replacement at Fiorentina, Krzysztof Piatek scored his sixth goal since arriving in Florence in January in a 1-1 home draw with Verona.
Piatek opened the scoring with a neatly taken finish with nine minutes on the clock but Gianluca Caprari levelled the scores from the penalty spot 10 minutes later.
Lucas Torreira then missed two sitters for the hosts who are 10 points behind Juve and all but out of the Champions League race despite having a game in hand.
Domenico Berardi continued his impressive season for Sassuolo with a brace of penalties in a 4-1 win at struggling Venezia.
