Cristiano Ronaldo brace rescues dethroned Juventus against Udinese

Juventus' Portuguese forward Cristiano Ronaldo celebrates after scoring a goal with his teammates Juventus' Spanish forward Alvaro Morata (L) and Juventus' French midfielder Adrien Rabiot from France (R) during the Italian Serie A football match between Udinese and Juventus at the Dacia Arena Stadium in Udine, on May 2, 2021.

A Cristiano Ronaldo brace rescued a 2-1 win for Juventus at Udinese on Sunday hours after the Turin giants surrendered their Serie A crown to Inter Milan.

Atalanta's draw at Sassuolo earlier in the day meant Inter secured a first scudetto since 2010 with the Nerazzurri 13 points clear with four games remaining.


Juve's win moves them up to third as they target a Champions League spot, but are equal on 69 points with second-placed Atalanta and AC Milan in fourth.

Napoli are two points behind in fifth after a 1-1 draw against Cagliari while Lazio are still in the running, five points off a top-four finish with a game in hand after an exciting 4-3 win over Genoa.

"The nine years are over, we will no longer have the scudetto attached to the shirt, but we will start again with the same desire as before," said Juve coach Andrea Pirlo.

"We earned this win with effort and pride, and it's a very important one given the other results this afternoon.

"We lost points against teams that we should have beaten, sometimes naively, we let Inter escape and now we are focused on reaching the Champions League."

Juventus had trailed for most of the game in Udine after Nahuel Molina put Udinese ahead in the 10th minute, blasting in off a quickly taken Rodrigo De Paul free-kick while Juventus players were still protesting.

The equaliser came with seven minutes to go after De Paul conceded a penalty for handball from a Ronaldo free-kick, with the Portuguese forward making no mistake from the penalty spot.

Four minutes later he grabbed the winner when he headed home an Adrien Rabiot cross, with relieved coach Andrea Pirlo racing to join the celebrations.

Ronaldo's brace takes his Serie A-leading tally to 27 goals, six more than Inter's Romelu Lukaku.

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