Juventus 3-0 Napoli: Turin giants produce strong second-half display and close gap to leaders AC Milan to two points

Juventus underlined their title credentials with an ultimately facile 3-0 victory over Napoli in Turin on Sunday night.

After a dour first half, the Bianconeri opened the scoring midway through the second period when Leonardo Bonucci deflected a short from Mirko Vucinic past a helpless Morgan De Sanctis.

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The Bianconeri put the seal on a victory which draws them to within points of Serie A leaders AC Milan when De Sanctis somehow allowed a shot from Quagliarella to beat him at his near post.

Arturo Vidal scored a sublime second before substitute Fabio Quagliarella completed the rout with a late third.

Both sides initially appeared intent on picking up where they left off at the San Paolo in November, treating us to a wonderfully open start to the game.

The hosts looked particularly menacing and really should have taken the lead just four minutes in but Marco Borriello – surprisingly recalled to the Juventus starting lineup – inexplicably failed to get his head on the end of the most delicious delivery from Pirlo. Borriello did manage to connect with a Stephan Lichtsteiner cross moments later but the on-loan forward’s header flashed wide.

The Partenopei then gave Juve an almighty scare on 13 minutes when Hamsik found himself in on goal after a delightful one-two with Ezequiel Lavezzi but in trying to take the ball around the onrushing Gianluigi Buffon, the Slovakian knocked it too far ahead of himself and it rolled harmlessly out of play.

After such a promising opening, the game deteriorated rapidly thereafter, with Juve only threatening sporadically through set-pieces from Pirlo, while Napoli were restricted to nothing more than long-range strikes from the likes of Hamsik.

The second half continued in the same vain so the source of the game’s opening goal came as no surprise, Napoli failing to deal with a free-kick from Pirlo from the right-hand side which bobbled around in the box before Bonucci diverted a hopeful effort from Vucinic into the back of the net.

The visitors tried to rally but to absolutely no avail and Vidal deservedly doubled the home side’s advantage when he fired home after turning Hugo Campagnaro inside out.

with this winning, distance point of capolista temporary AC Milan is only 2 points