Juventus stumble to win at Palermo thanks to Alves' lucky deflected shot

An own goal by Palermo's Edoardo Goldaniga was enough to give champions Juventus a 1-0 victory in Sicily on Saturday to extend their lead at the top of Serie A to four points.

Brazilian defender Dani Alves, who joined from Barcelona in the close season, fired in from 25 metres with the ball taking a wicked deflection off Goldaniga's leg to hand Juve their fifth win in six league matches in a scrappy encounter.

“I told the lads we had two objectives today – to win the game and not concede," said manager Max Allegri, talking to Sky Sport Italia.

"Obviously we need to improve, as we made too many mistakes on a technical level with misplaced passes, but we take the three points after a tough run of games."

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Paulo Dybala was rested in favour of a double centre-forward system with Gonzalo Higuain and Mario Mandzukic which seemed to throw Juve out of kilter - but Allegri defended his misfiring players.

“It was the first time really for the two strikers together and they didn’t combine, but then that is not in their characteristics," he said.

"They did well to sacrifice themselves and help out in defence. In my view, they played well. Considering what I asked of them, they did well and we created some chances thanks to them.”

Leonardo Bonucci was gloomy after the hard-fought 1-0 away win:

"This teaches us that we need to improve game by game, as pressing and doing well in one match against Cagliari is not enough,” the defender told Sky Sport Italia.

"I compliment Palermo and their Coach Roberto De Zerbi, as they played well and defended well too. We have to take the points and two consecutive clean sheets, but cannot think this was the real Juventus...

"When we misplace as many passes as this, it doesn’t matter who is on the field, we are Juve players and cannot do that. Now there is another game to win in Zagreb.”

Juventus, who had crushed Cagliari 4-0 in midweek with Alves on target, struggled with a tight Palermo defence in the first half, with both Gonzalo Higuain and Mario Mandzukic failing to put them ahead with several good scoring chances.

Alves finally broke the deadlock four minutes after the restart with his deflected strike beating Palermo keeper Josip Posavec to put the visitors ahead and the effort awarded as an own goal by Goldaniga.

Mandzukic should have doubled their lead on two occasions late in the game but both times Croatian Posavec denied his fellow countryman.

Juventus, who never hit top form, move up to 15 points.

Second-placed Napoli are on 14 after easing past Chievo with first half goals from Manolo Gabbiadini and captain Marek Hamsik.

Napoli bounced back from their goalless midweek draw at Genoa but the visitors should have pulled a goal back in the 73rd when substitute Floro Flores only had keeper Pepe Reina to beat but stumbled and had the ball snatched away.

AS Roma, on 10 points, are in action in Torino on Sunday.

Reporting via Reuters and Football Italia

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