Juve squeeze past Spezia to boost late title push

Juventus’ French midfielder Adrien Rabiot (L) is challenged by Spezia’s Italian forward Daniele Verde during the Italian Serie A football match between Juventus and Spezia at the Juventus stadium in Turin, on March 6, 2022. (Photo by MIGUEL MEDINA / AFP)

Juventus continued their slow creep into the Serie A title race on Saturday with a 1-0 win over Spezia which moved them to within five points of leaders Inter Milan.

Alvaro Morata scored for the first time since mid-January with 20 minutes on the clock at the Allianz Stadium in Turin to keep Juve on the heels of champions Inter, who hammered Salernitana 5-0 on Friday.

Juve could find themselves seven points from the summit as Napoli host AC Milan in Sunday’s late match, with both a point behind Inter ahead of one of the biggest matches of the season so far.

However, regardless of the result at the Stadio Diego Armando Maradona, Juve are applying pressure thanks to a run of 14 league matches without defeat stretching back to the end of November.

Coach Massimiliano Allegri has repeatedly insisted that Juve are not in the title race and Morata was equally evasive when asked about his team’s ambitions for the season.

“I’m of my own opinion which is to think about the next training session and the next match. We can’t think about it too much,” he told DAZN.

Sunday’s was a far from accomplished performance from a team missing a host of players including Paulo Dybala, Weston McKennie, Giorgio Chiellini, Leonardo Bonucci and Denis Zakaria.

Juve’s only goal came thanks to a dreadful error from Spezia goalkeeper Ivan Provedel, who hit a bad kick straight to Daniele Rugani.

The centre-back passed to Dusan Vlahovic, whose lay off to Manuel Locatelli was followed by a quick pass to Morata,