Following the international break, Saturday’s Serie A matches saw narrow home victories for both Milan and Juventus against Udinese and Lazio, respectively. At San Siro, despite playing with ten men for two-thirds of the match due to Reijnders’ red card in the 29th minute, the Rossoneri skillfully capitalized on an early goal from Chukwueze in the 13th minute. They were fortunate when Udinese had a last-minute equalizer ruled out for a controversial foul in the buildup to the goal. Juventus, on the other hand, took advantage of a 75-minute numerical superiority after Lazio’s Romagnoli was sent off in the 25th minute. However, the home side only managed to convert their territorial dominance into a goal in the 85th minute, thanks to an unfortunate own goal by Gila.
With this victory, the Bianconeri kept pace with Napoli, who are led by the club’s former great, Antonio Conte, still at the top of the standings. In the Sunday lunch match at 12:30, Napoli faced a tough challenge in the first half against Empoli but secured the win with a penalty converted by Kvara in the second half. Notably, Lukaku struggled to make an impact, being contained by the Tuscan defense and substituted for Simeone, who played a crucial role in the penalty incident. There was significant controversy surrounding the penalty awarded to Napoli, as the foul on Simeone appeared less severe than an unpunished incident involving Baldanzi at the end of Monza-Roma, reigniting discussions about VAR usage and inconsistent referee decisions in similar situations.
The big match of the eighth round took place at 20:45 on Sunday at the Stadio Olimpico, where Roma faced Inter. The away victory for Inzaghi’s side came again by a narrow margin, taking advantage of two glaring errors from Roma during the same play: first, Zalewski lost a critical ball in midfield, allowing Inter to counterattack, and then Celik inexplicably set up Lautaro’s shot in the box instead of clearing the ball. In the post-match comments, Juric expressed satisfaction with his team’s performance, claiming that Roma dominated the match, but highlighted Svilar as the standout player, making crucial saves on at least three occasions. It seems it’s all a matter of perspective.
