Bologna beats Udinese to join Inter and Roma at top of Serie A

MILAN (AP) – And then there were three.

Bologna moved level with Inter Milan and Roma on 24 points atop Serie A after a 3-0 win at Udinese on Saturday, despite a rare penalty miss from Riccardo Orsolini.

Orsolini, the league’s leading goalscorer, recovered from that miss to set up Tommaso Pobega for the first of his two goals.

Roma visits Cremonese on Sunday, shortly before Inter plays Milan in a city derby.

Milan has just two points less than the top three and is level with Napoli, which was playing Atalanta later Saturday.

Juventus was on 20 points after drawing 1-1 at bottom team Fiorentina.

Bologna struggled to break Udinese down but was given a golden chance shortly before halftime when Udinese defender Kingsley Ehizibue blocked Pobega’s shot with his elbow.

However, Maduka Okoye saved the resulting penalty from Orsolini – who had scored 15 of his 16 previous spot kicks.

Orsolini thought he had redeemed himself minutes later but his would-be goal was ruled out for offside.

Bologna broke the deadlock in the 54th minute. Orsolini knocked down a cross-field pass and cut inside before rolling it across for Pobega to drill into the bottom left corner.

Worse was to come for Udinese six minutes later as Okoye’s terrible pass was intercepted by Pobega to score his second of the game.

Udinese did not learn from that and got into another mess trying to play out from the back in stoppage time, allowing Federico Bernardeschi to sweep into an empty net.

Juventus was held to its third straight draw as it struggled to deal with Fiorentina and a fired-up Moise Kean.

The 25-year-old Kean, who started his career at Juventus, was returning from a shin injury and he was Fiorentina’s most threatening player in the first half, during which he hit the crossbar.

Juventus took the lead in the sixth minute of stoppage time with a fierce, 25-yard shot from Filip Kostic.

There had been so much time added on because play had to be halted because of racist chanting directed at former Fiorentina forward Dusan Vlahovic, who is Serbian, and there had also been a lengthy video review that led to a penalty being revoked after being awarded to Juventus

Fiorentina leveled almost immediately after halftime as two former Juve players combined with Kean setting up Rolando Mandragora for a long-range strike into the far top corner.

Elsewhere, Daniele De Rossi’s Genoa drew 3-3 at Cagliari in a relegation battle. Genoa moved level with 17th-placed Parma, three points below Cagliari.