At the Stadio Barbera Dejan Stankovic was stretchered off and Inter faltered, failing to score, although they hit Palermo's crossbar. With Inter slipping-up it was down to the chasing pack to make sure that they won their games.
Juventus, on Saturday evening, had already failed to do just that, as their luck finally ran out at the Stadio San Paolo against a Napoli side who were awarded two iffy penalties. The game was a 0-0 draw at half-time, but just seconds after the restart Del Piero scored after a neat little move between Palladino and Trezeguet. The Juve lead was cancelled out three minutes later, when Walter Gargano took their defence apart, shaking off several tackles, before firing into the bottom corner. The first penalty came in the 62nd minute when Chiellini appeared to fairly tackle Lavezzi in the area. Domizzi sent Buffon the wrong way to make it 2-1. History repeated itself eight minutes later as Zalayeta dived over Buffon to gain another penalty and Domizzi repeated his shot for another goal. The final score, 3-1, left Juve hopping mad at the penalty decisions.
Roma travelled to the Stadio Meazza to take on Milan and a win would mean that they would climb above Juve in the table. It was a tight game, won by one goal, from Roma's Vucinic in the 72nd minute after Cicinho crossed from the right to set up a diving header.
That left the Sunday evening clash between Fiorentina and Genoa to decide who would be in second place behind Inter. The Stadio Ferraris saw a tactical game that both teams came away from with one point. Sebastien Frey in the Fiorentina goal proved to be their saviour, as he pulled off some great saves from Mutu and company. So Fiorentina were left in fourth place on equal points with Juve. It's looking really interesting at the top right now.
THIS WEEK'S RESULTS
Catania 2-0 Sampdoria
Empoli 0-1 Atalanta
Genoa 0-0 Fiorentina (eve.)
Lazio 0-1 Udinese
Milan 0-1 Roma
Napoli 3-1 Juventus (Sat eve.)
Palermo 0-0 Inter
Parma 3-2 Livorno
Siena 0-0 Reggina
Torino 2-0 Cagliari (Sat eve.)
SERIE A TABLE
Pts P W D L F A
Inter 21 9 6 3 0 17 5
Roma 18 9 5 3 1 20 12
Juventus 17 9 5 2 2 18 10
Fiorentina 17 9 4 5 0 16 7
Udinese 15 9 4 3 2 10 11
Napoli 14 9 4 2 3 17 11
Atalanta 14 9 3 5 1 11 10
Catania 13 9 3 4 2 8 7
Palermo 13 9 3 4 2 11 11
Genoa 13 9 3 4 2 8 8
Torino 11 9 2 5 2 11 11
Sampdoria 11 9 3 2 4 8 9
Milan 10 9 2 4 3 13 9
Lazio 10 9 2 4 3 9 12
Parma 9 9 2 3 4 10 16
Cagliari 8 9 2 2 5 8 13
Empoli 8 9 2 2 5 5 11
Siena 7 9 1 4 4 7 12
Reggina 5 9 0 5 4 5 14
Livorno 2 9 0 2 7 8 21
