Chinese football season to begin on July 25 after five-month delay
ROME: Juventus maintained their four-point lead at the top of Serie A on Tuesday after strolling to a 3-1 win at Genoa that keeps chasers Lazio at bay despite their comeback triumph at Torino.
Three stunning individual goals from Paulo Dybala, Cristiano Ronaldo and Douglas Costa downed relegation-threatened Genoa and kept Maurizio Sarri on course to deliver Juve’s ninth straight league title in his first season as coach.
Andrea Pinamonti pulled one back with 14 minutes left for the struggling hosts, who stay just one point above the drop zone and third-from-bottom Lecce, who host Genoa’s local rivals Sampdoria on Wednesday.
Pinamonti’s strike was the first goal Juve have conceded since losing at Lyon in late February, but it wasn’t enough to stop the champions from cruising to their sixth straight league win.
“It was a good team effort and we scored three brilliant goals,” said Sarri.
“The team have recovered well after the disappointment of losing the Italian Cup final, it was only a matter of time.” The victory at the Stadio Luigi Ferraris showcased the firepower Sarri has at his disposal, with Genoa goalkeeper Mattia Perin making five saves in the goalless first half as Juve pushed early to win the match.
Dybala put his side in the lead in the 50th minute with a beautiful finish following a snaking dribble, a strike that set the tone for the rest of the match.
Ronaldo, who had looked off the pace following the league’s restart from the coronavirus shutdown, showed that he was back to his best seven minutes later when he charged towards goal before letting off a rocket of a shot that Perin could only grasp at as it fired into the net. That settled the result, but substitute Costa then made his own case for goal of the match when he collected the ball towards the right side of the area and unleashed a curling, dipping shot that again left Perin bewildered.
Agence France-presse
BEIJING: The Chinese Super League season will begin on July 25 after the coronavirus pandemic delayed it by five months, the country’s football association said on Wednesday.
It is a major boost for sport in China and another sign of life returning to normality in the country where COVID-19 emerged late last year before spreading globally.
The 16-team league, which had been originally due to kick off in February, will be played under a different format instead of the usual home-andaway competition.
Clubs will be split into two groups, one in the northeastern city of Dalian and the other in Suzhou, near Shanghai, the China Football Association (CFA) said.
The CFA said the league would “strictly abide by the requirements of national epidemic prevention work”.
But the CFA statement did not say whether fans would be allowed to attend, or which teams will play in each group in the revamped format.
The CSL, which has drawn international interest in recent years by luring big-name players and coaches on world-leading wages, had been scheduled to start on February 22.
However, it became one of the first sporting victims of the coronavirus in January when the new season was indefinitely postponed.
The CFA said in February that it would introduce an extra transfer window before the league started to help clubs struggling to complete player transfers due to the outbreak. The Chinese Basketball Association (CBA) became the first professional sports league in China to resume on June 20, although no fans are allowed to attend matches.
The CBA has similarly divided up into two groups in two cities to prevent the spread of infections.
There has only been one confirmed coronavirus case among Chinese Super League players -- Shandong Luneng’s former Manchester United midfielder Marouane Fellaini.
The Belgian international tested positive in March, just after returning to China for the new season, and spent three weeks in hospital.