Ronaldo's Absence Backfires As Juve Drop Points
27 October, 2019
The decision to rest Cristiano Ronaldo backfired for Maurizio Sarri as Juventus dropped points away to Lecce in Serie A on Saturday afternoon.
Maurizio Sarri opted to rest Ronaldo for the encounter as Federico Bernardeschi was brought into the attack alongside Paulo Dybala and Gonzalo Higuain.
Juve had the ball in the back of the net after 15 minutes when Higuain turned home Alex Sandro's cross, but the Argentine's strike was ruled out by the Video Assistant Referee for an offside.
It was one-way traffic in the first half though, as Lecce had no answer for Juve's dominance while their only real sniff at goal came via Panagiotis Tachtsidis' long-range effort after 34 minutes.
Unfortunately for both sides' Tachtsidis' strike proved to be the final chance of the first half, as Sarri's charges were unable to make the dominance count in the opening 45 minutes.
It took Juve five minutes into the second stanza to get the breakthrough as Dybala got the opening goal from the penalty spot after Miralem Pjanic was brought down in the box.
However, Lecce were awarded a penalty of their own six minutes later, which allowed Mancosu to step up and convert past Wojciech Szczesny to restore parity.
The Old Lady threw everything forward in search of a second goal, with Dybala and Bernardeschi going close with efforts from distance after 77 minutes.
Try as they may, the defending champions were unable to find a way past the Lecce defence as the encounter ended all square, which will give Inter the chance to move top this evening.