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Napoli, Juve runs continue, Inter salvage 3-3 draw

Football Soccer - Napoli v Carpi Serie A - San Paolo Stadium, Naples, Italy - 07/02/16. Napoli's Gonzalo Higuain (R) and Carpi's Simone Romagnoli in action. REUTERS/Stringer

By Ed Dove

(Reuters) - Napoli beat 10-man visitors Carpi 1-0 and Juventus won 2-0 at second-bottom Frosinone on Sunday as the leading pair extended their Serie A winning streaks to move further ahead at the top of the table.

Napoli saw off lowly Carpi thanks to Gonzalo Higuain's penalty for a club-record eighth consecutive league win to keep a two-point lead, while Juve in second made it 14 straight wins as goals by Juan Cuadrado and Paulo Dybala downed Frosinone.

Serie A looks like a two-horse race after Inter Milan failed to reignite their flickering title hopes as Ivan Perisic's late equaliser salvaged a 3-3 draw at bottom club Hellas Verona.

The result leaves Inter fourth on 45 points, 11 behind leaders Napoli and nine adrift of Juve, with Fiorentina in third place on 46 after they drew 1-1 at Bologna on Saturday.

Fifth-placed AS Roma capitalised on the failure of Inter and Fiore to win as they closed within a point of the top four with a 2-1 home victory over Sampdoria that took them to 44.

Napoli fans supported defender Kalidou Koulibaly, who suffered racist abuse in a midweek win at Lazio, by wearing masks of the Senegal international, and the centre back won the decsisive 69th-minute penalty when fouled by Fabio Daprela.

Higuain converted the spot kick for his 24th goal of the season to edge a resilient Carpi side who had Raffaele Bianco dismissed for a second yellow card in a case of mistaken identity in the 56th minute.

"Winning eight games in a row had never happened before (at the club)," Napoli's Marek Hamsik told Mediaset Premium. "We are happy to make history."

Juve defeated relegation-threatened Frosinone after a 73rd-minute opener from Chelsea loanee Cuadrado and a delicious curling effort from Dybala in the first minute of stoppage time.

The top two meet on Saturday when Napoli travel to Turin, although Juventus coach Massimiliano Allegri has refused to consider the match a title decider.

“It’ll be an excellent game," Allegri told Mediaset Premium. "It certainly won’t decide the Scudetto, but we’ll be ready.

"We'll be up for a great game," said Hamsik. "It's a knockout match. We're going for the win."

INTER BREACHED

Inter's once-watertight defence was breached twice inside the first 16 minutes when Verona's Filip Helander and Eros Pisano cancelled out Jeison Murillo's eighth-minute header.

Roberto Mancini's Inter team have kept 13 clean sheets so far this season, but their defence has struggled to convince in the New Year and they were undone twice in four minutes as Helander and Pisano headed home Luca Marrone free kicks.

Verona's Artur Ionita then diverted a Marrone corner past Samir Handanovic to make it 3-1 in the 57th minute before Inter responded through Mauro Icardi in the 61st.

Perisic then rescued a point in the 78th when his finish was fumbled into the back of the net by keeper Pierluigi Gollini.

“We threw away two points and it could have been worse," Mancini told Sky Sport Italia. “We will continue to fight and can hopefully put together a run of victories.”

Verona, who had not won a league match this season before a midweek victory over Atalanta, extended their unbeaten run to five games but will be distraught at having let a two-goal lead slip. They remained last on 15 points.

A header by Roma's Alessandro Florenzi's and Diego Perotti's stunning volley helped the Capital club, whose kit carried a message celebrating Chinese New Year, to a 2-1 home win over lowly Sampdoria.

Sixth-placed AC Milan drew 1-1 with Udinese, Sassuolo and Palermo drew 2-2 and Chievo won 2-1 at Torino.

(Reporting by Ed Dove; Editing by Toby Davis and Ken Ferris)