Serie A: Juventus woes deepened as champions suffer defeat against Atlanta

Atalanta overtook Juventus in Serie A thanks to a 1-0 win on Sunday afternoon, as the race for the Champions League spots intensifies in Serie A.

It was always going to be a slightly more difficult ask of Juventus than usual, given Cristiano Ronaldo’s absence and their poor record without him, but even they probably could not anticipate the brilliance of Atalanta.

Not long after the half-hour mark though, perhaps the best opportunity of the game fell to the Bianconeri’s Alvaro Morata when a moment of indecision led to calamity for Joakim Maehle inside his own box.

Federico Chiesa picked his pocket and supplied Morata, whose deft effort was cleared off the line by Berat Djimsiti.

Atalanta had an equally good chance of their own around ten minutes prior, albeit with the same outcome.

Luis Muriel and Matteo Pessina combined well to enable Pessina to find his way into the penalty area, but he pondered over the shot so much that when he eventually pulled the trigger Matthijs de Ligt was on hand to block it.

In the second half, it was Atalanta who had the better chances and they finally made it count in the 87th minute thanks to a pair of inspired substitutions by Gian Piero Gasperini.

Ruslan Malinovsky was squared the ball by fellow substitute Josip Ilicic just outside the area and his powerful left-footed shot was deflected into the back of the net just a minute after he had a storming free-kick from range kept out by a wonderful save by Wojciech Szczesny.