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Atalanta paid the penalty for some rash defending as Fiorentina ran out 2-1 winners at the Gewiss Stadium in Serie A on Saturday night, with all three gaols coming from the spot.
Dusan Vlahovic netted a penalty in each half to send his team into sixth place in the Serie A standings on a weekend in which Italy’s top flight got back underway after the international break. The hosts managed to reply with a spot kick of their own from Duvan Zapata, but it wasn’t enough on the night.
Both coaches made changes to their teams, most notably Marco Sportiello replacing Juan Musso in the Atalanta goal and Lucas Torreira coming in for his Fiorentina debut in place of Erick Pulgar.
Atalanta thought they’d taken the lead on the 10th minute when Berat Djimsiti tucked the ball home nicely following Nikola Milenkovic’s sliding block from a Zapata effort. The ball fell kindly at the feet of the defender for him to sweep home, only for VAR to intervene and rule it out for offside a few minutes later.
Vincenzo Italiano’s team were then awarded their first penalty on the half-hour mark following Joakim Maehle’s handball. Up stepped Vlahovic to emphatically score his second Serie A goal of the season from 12 yards.
The second half started with a couple of changes for La Dea as Ruslan Malinovski replaced Aleksei Maranchuk, and Robin Gosens took the place of Maehle, who was on a yellow card.
However, La Viola doubled their lead on the 49th minute via another sweetly struck Vlahovic penalty after Giacomo Bonaventura was fouled in the area. The midfielder had taken advantage of a slack pass before bursting into the box and pulling off a couple of stepovers before being subsequently upended.
Gian Piero Gasperini’s team were awarded a penalty of their own, and Zapata – on his first appearance of the season – stepped up to despatch it, thus halving the deficit to 2-1.
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