Serie A roundup: Spezia thumped to remain in deep trouble, Salernitana mount comeback
Salernitana 3 Udinese 2
The opening 20 minutes of the contest passed by almost without goalmouth action, with Tonny Vilhena’s wild shot from distance the only notable chance in the early exchanges. As the first half moved past the midway point, however, Udinese found their groove and subsequently took the lead with the game’s first shot on target.
Sandi Lovrić’s deflected pass allowed Marvin Zeegelaar to stroke home his first goal since scoring a consolation in a 4-1 defeat to Juventus in January 2021.
With confidence now oozing through the side, Udinese quickly added a second on the half-hour mark. Florian Thauvin’s perfectly weighted pass found the run of Roberto Pereyra, who squared the ball for Ilija Nestorovski to tap home.
The hosts looked set to head down the tunnel faced with a two-goal deficit, but Grigoris Kastanos came to the rescue, directing a sublime curling effort into the top corner to give his side a lifeline just before the break.
After carrying momentum into the interval, Salernitana required only 12 second-half minutes to pull themselves level, as Pasquale Mazzocchi laid a free-kick off for Antonio Candreva to rifle an unstoppable strike past the despairing dive of Marco Silvestri.
As the contest drifted into the final 20 minutes, Beto attempted to restore Udinese’s lead, but he was thwarted by the onrushing Vincenzo Fiorillo. Just moments later, the visitors spurned another promising opportunity when Tolgay Arslan blazed over from inside the box, but their hopes of finding a winner were effectively ended when Zeegelaar was shown a second yellow card late on.
Instead, it was the hosts who scored a dramatic winner, as former Udinese player William Troost-Ekong haunted his old club, tucking the ball home from Junior Sambia’s delivery.
The result means Salernitana can celebrate their first-ever home win over Udinese in Serie A, moving them onto 42 points. While the hosts end the day in 15th place, a third consecutive defeat leaves Udinese in 12th position.
Flashscore Man of the Match: Antonio Candreva (Salernitana)
See stats and player ratings from the match at Flashscore
Spezia 0 Torino 4
With Europe out of Torino’s reach, their only objective here was to consolidate a top-half finish. Contrastingly, Spezia were in desperate need of a win, with just one point separating themselves and 18th place Verona. It was the away side who got off to a better start though, as Aleksei Miranchuk almost opened the scoring with a thunderous effort from outside the box, but he was denied by the crossbar.
Torino’s dominance continued unabated, and Il Toro finally got the goal they deserved near the half-hour mark, as a corner whipped into the box evaded all Spezia defenders and deflected in via Przemyslaw Wisniewski for an OG, despite not seeming to know much about it.
Against the run of play, however, Spezia thought they would have the opportunity to equalise from the penalty spot just before HT. But following a VAR review, the decision was overturned after Emmanuel Gyasi was adjudged to have handled the ball in the box.
Clearly full of confidence, the visitors almost doubled their lead within minutes of the restart, but were once again denied by the woodwork, as Mërgim Vojvoda saw his shot cannon off the post. That decisive second goal did arrive in the 72nd minute though, as the home side began to commit men forward, it was inevitably leaving them open at the back and they were duly punished.
Nikola Vlašić drove forward before teeing up Samuele Ricci on the edge of the box and the Italian clinically fired the ball past Bartłomiej Drągowski.
Naturally, conceding a second goal seemed to deflate the Spezia players and two soon became three as Vlašić tore through their backline and this time laid the ball to Ivan Ilič who showed great composure in the box and slotted the ball in.
The home side thought they pulled a late consolation but M’bala Nzola’s goal was ruled out for offside, before Yann Karamoh added salt to the hosts' wounds with a fourth goal in stoppage time.
It was a drab end to a miserable home campaign for Spezia, but despite the loss, they remain in 17th place ahead of Verona, who face Empoli on Sunday.
Flashscore Man of the Match: Nikola Vlašić (Torino)
