Atalanta 1-0 Juventus: 5 hits and flops as Ruslan Malinovskiy dents Bianconeri's title hopes | Serie A 2020-21
Juventus suffered a fatal blow to their slim title hopes after Atalanta snatched a late 1-0 victory at the Stadio Atleti Azzurri d'Italia in a 2020-21 Serie A game.
Ruslan Malinovskiy scored in the 86th minute to give La Dea a key victory that has boosted their Champions League qualification hopes.
Without star player Cristiano Ronaldo, Juventus appeared toothless up front, mustering just one shot on target from 11 attempts.
The home side were also guilty of missing a few chances, even though goalkeeper Wojciech Szczesny deserves credit for his heroics late in the game. Yet, there was nothing Szczesny could do to stop the winning goal, as Malinovsky's terrific long-range effort took a nasty deflection on its way in, leaving the Juventus custodian stranded.
The defeat leaves Juventus in fourth and hanging onto a Champions League place as their slim hopes of a tenth consecutive Scudetto are all but over.
On that note, let's take a look at five hits and flops from the match:
Hit: Ruslan Malinovskiy (Atalanta)
Cometh the hour, cometh Ruslan Malinovskiy. The supersub came off the bench to make the difference for Atlanta, condemning Juventus to a defeat with a special goal.
The Ukrainian launched a 25-yard pile driver after latching onto Josip Illicic's quick corner. Even though the ball took a deflection off Alex Sandro on its way into the net, his sheer audacity to even attempt a shot like that was ridiculous.
Malinovskiy doesn't score too many goals, but whenever he does, he makes sure they are big ones.
Flop: Paulo Dybala (Juventus)
Just when it was thought he had returned to form and still had the ability to lead Juventus, Paulo Dybala dropped a stinker against Atalanta.
With Cristiano Ronaldo sidelined from the clash, this was an opportunity for the out-of-favour Argentine to make an impression. But other than three key passes in the opening stanza, there was nothing of note from him.
Dybala failed to muster a single effort on goal, showing he isn't a prolific scorer like he used to be.