Juventus player ratings vs Inter Milan: Dybala and Higuain send Juve to top of table
By John Vaccaro
Juventus has retaken their place atop the Serie A table.
It certainly wasn’t easy and it looked for most of the second half like it wasn’t going to happen, but Juve was able to leapfrog Inter Milan on Sunday.
It didn’t take them long to take the lead in the match against Inter. In the 4th minute, Miralem Pjanic played a long pass to Paulo Dybala who managed to beat the keeper at the far post from a tight angle. Inter would strike back before the half, though.
In the 18th minute, Matthijs de Ligt inexplicably lunged at a cross with his arm extended and gave away a penalty. Lautaro Martinez would make him pay for the mistake as he buried the penalty in the corner, beating Wojciech Szczesny who had guessed right, but still couldn’t get to the ball. The match would go to halftime tied at 1.
It took nearly the entire second half for Juve to get their second goal and it was 2 substitutes who combined to make it happen. In the 80th minute, Rodrigo Bentancur played a pass to Gonzalo Higuain that set Higuain up with space to finish inside the box and he wouldn’t waste the chance. Higuain’s goal would give Juve the 2-1 and the win that put them back on top of Serie A.
GK: Wojciech Szczesny 7/10
This was yet another impressive performance for Wojciech Szczesny. The only goal he allowed was a perfectly taken free kick, which absolutely can’t be held against him. Outside of that one blemish on his record, the only other moment where he was anything other than immaculate was the odd moment where he tried to pass to Miralem Pjanic while he wasn’t looking at him. The only other action he saw was making a couple of nice saves to keep Inter from adding a second goal to their tally. I may have picked Samir Handanovic to start in the Juve-Inter combined 11, but Szczesny continues to show that he is right there with him among the best keepers in the league.