Milan (AFP) – Cristiano Ronaldo scored twicee as Juventus brought the curtain down on a record-breaking 2018 with a 2-1 win over Sampdoria before the three-week winter break in Italy.
Ronaldo powered the unbeaten reigning champions to a record number of points from the first half of the season with 53 from 19 games.
Napoli are nine points behind in second, with Inter Milan a further five adrift in third, days after their clash at the San Siro was marred by the death of a supporter and Senegalese defender Kalidou Koulibaly being targeted by racist chanting.
Here are five talking points from Serie A this weekend:
Numbers game for goal-machine Ronaldo
Ronaldo overtook Rui Barros as the Portuguese player to score the most goals in a Serie A season, bettering his compatriot’s 12 goals for Juventus in 1988-1989.
Ronaldo scored within two minutes and added a second from the spot for his 14th goal of the campaign. It was also Juve’s 100th goal of 2018 in all competitions, with Ronaldo having already scored the club’s 5,000th goal in Serie A against Torino mid-December.
The five-time Ballon d’Or winner has scored 49 goals in 2018 of which 15 in 23 games were for Juventus, 28 in 22 games for Real Madrid and six in seven games for Portugal.
The 33-year-old is second in 2018 behind Barcelona’s Lionel Messi, who topped the year’s goal-scoring chart with 51.
Higuain revives AC Milan
Gonzalo Higuain ended his two-month goal-scoring drought, netting the winner amid great emotion in the San Siro for a 2-1 success over SPAL which threw coach Gennaro Gattuso a lifeline.
The seven-time European champions have dropped out of the Champions League places, having failed to score in four games for the first time since 1984.
And forward Higuain, who scored 16 Serie A goals for Juventus last season before going on loan to Milan to make way for Ronaldo, has been linked with a move to Chelsea.
“Higuain really struggled to deal with this negative period, but hopefully has broken through that mental block,” said Gattuso.
Roma looking up
Things are looking up for Roma after a difficult start to the season with Bryan Cristante and Cengiz Under sealing a 2-0 win over Parma to move to within two points of the Champions League places.
“We’ve rediscovered our identity,” said coach Eusebio Di Francesco after achieving back-to-back wins for just the third time this season.
from World Soccer Talk http://bit.ly/2EYaX29
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