SSC Napoli on Wednesday fell to a 2-1 defeat by relegation-threatened Empoli, opening the way for Juventus to claim an eighth consecutive Scudetto as early as this weekend, while Mauro Icardi returned to help Inter get back to winning ways.
Juventus on Tuesday beat Cagliari 2-0 in a match overshadowed by the racist abuse of Moise Kean and Blaise Matuidi in Sardinia and now have an 18-point lead on second-placed Napoli.
The Turin, Italy-based giants play AC Milan at home this weekend and would claim another title if they open up a 21-point gap on Napoli, who have lost both their matches this season to Juventus.
Juventus, who are missing Cristiano Ronaldo to a thigh injury, would need to beat AC Milan and for Carlo Ancelotti’s Napoli to lose to Genoa on Sunday in order to seal the championship.
“We deserved to lose,” Ancelotti said after his side’s fifth defeat this season, as they prepare for a UEFA Europa League quarter-final first leg against Arsenal next week.
“We have to roll up our sleeves and think about the next game. We were messy, inattentive, we didn’t follow plans,” he said. “It was a subdued performance in general. We lacked ideas and legs.”
Diego Farias opened the scoring on 28 minutes for the hosts in Tuscany with a shot that took a deflection off Napoli midfielder Piotr Zielinski.
Former Empoli loanee Zielinski made up for his error just before the break with a superb shot from distance to equalize.
However, Giovanni di Lorenzo sealed a precious three points for Empoli on 53 minutes, with the strugglers holding on to move out of the bottom three.
Icardi marked his return after nearly two months out amid a contract dispute that saw him stripped of the captaincy by scoring Inter’s second goal from the spot in a 4-0 thrashing of Genoa.
The Argentine was whistled and insulted by the traveling Inter fans in the western port city, but shrugged off the cobwebs of his weeks of absence, although he was denied the opener by the post in the 20th minute.
Icardi scored Inter’s second goal from the spot after Cristian Romero was sent off for a foul on the striker five minutes before halftime as he raced through on goal.
Icardi converted the penalty for his 10th league goal this season and first since Dec. 15 last year.
The Argentine then set up Ivan Perisic for the third.
Roberto Gagliardini bagged his second brace this season against Genoa, after also scoring two in the reverse fixture.
Inter, in third, last weekend lost 1-0 to SS Lazio, but have again reduced the gap on Napoli to seven points and are four ahead of AC Milan, who were held 1-1 by Udinese on Tuesday.
The battle for the final UEFA Champions League berth remains tight, with Atalanta BC, Lazio and AS Roma all within touching distance.
Lazio, with a game in hand, fell 1-0 to lowly SPAL, with Andrea Petagna scoring from the spot to move the side from Emilia-Romagna four points clear of the relegation zone.
Claudio Ranieri’s Roma avoided a third straight defeat by snatching a 2-2 draw at home against ACF Fiorentina, after twice being led by the team who had hammered the Romans 7-1 in the Coppa Italia.
Atalanta, in fifth, can edge closer to the Champions League places when they host Bologna on Thursday next week.
Revelations of positive doping tests for nearly two dozen Chinese swimmers that went unpunished sparked an intense flurry of accusations and legal threats between the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) and the head of the US drug-fighting organization, who has long been one of WADA’s fiercest critics. WADA on Saturday said it was turning to legal counsel to address a statement released by US Anti-Doping Agency (USADA) CEO Travis Tygart, who said WADA and anti-doping authorities in China swept positive tests “under the carpet by failing to fairly and evenly follow the global rules that apply to everyone else in the world.” The
Taiwanese judoka Yang Yung-wei on Saturday won silver in the men’s under-60kg category at the Asian Judo Championships in Hong Kong. Nicknamed the “judo heartthrob” in Taiwan, the Olympic silver-medalist missed out on his first Asian Championships gold when he lost to Japanese judoka Taiki Nakamura in the finals. Yang defeated three opponents on Saturday to reach the final after receiving a bye through the round of 32. He first topped Laotian Soukphaxay Sithisane in the round of 16 with two seoi nage (over-the-shoulder throws), then ousted Indian Vijay Kumar Yadav in the quarter-finals with his signature ude hishigi sankaku gatame (triangular armlock). He
Rafael Nadal on Wednesday said the upcoming French Open would be the moment to “give everything and die” on the court after his comeback from injury in Barcelona was curtailed by Alex de Minaur. The 22-time Grand Slam title winner, back playing this week after three months on the sidelines, battled well, but eventually crumbled 7-5, 6-1 against the world No. 11 from Australia in the second round. Nadal, 37, who missed virtually all of last season, is hoping to compete at the French Open next month where he is the record 14-time champion. The Spaniard said the clash with De Minaur was
RALLY: It was only the second time the Taiwanese has partnered with Kudermetova, and the match seemed tight until they won seven points in a row to take the last set 10-2 Taiwan’s Chan Hao-ching and Russia’s Veronika Kudermetova on Sunday won the Porsche Tennis Grand Prix women’s doubles final in Stuttgart, Germany. The pair defeated Norway’s Ulrikke Eikeri and Estonia’s Ingrid Neel 4-6, 6-3, 10-2 in a tightly contested match at the WTA 500 tournament. Chan and Kudermetova fell 4-6 in the first set after having their serve broken three times, although they played increasingly well. They fought back in the second set and managed to break their opponents’ serve in the eighth game to triumph 6-3. In the tiebreaker, Chan and Kudermetova took a 3-0 lead before their opponents clawed back two points, but