Juventus 4-0 Lecce: Bianconeri Ease to Comfortable Victory & Stretch Lead at The Top

Juventus eased to a 4-0 victory over relegation-battlers Lecce on Friday night, stretching their lead in the race for the Scudetto to seven points.

Paulo Dybala, Cristiano Ronaldo, Gonzalo Higuain and Matthijs de Ligt all got on the scoresheet for Maurizio Sarri's side, as Juve capitalised on Lazio's 3-2 defeat at Atalanta and Inter's 3-3 draw against Sassuolo on Wednesday evening.

Despite their eventual comfortable triumph, it took a while for the hosts to get a grip on proceedings - even with a man advantage following the sending off of Fabio Lucioni after some tenacious work from Rodrigo Bentancur. Andrea Rispoli had gone close for the visitors prior to Lucioni's dismissal just after the half-hour mark.

Nevertheless, Ronaldo and Federico Bernadeschi spurned glorious opportunities for the hosts as the two sides went into the break at 0-0.

Dybala soon handed Juve the lead after the restart, however, with a glorious strike from just outside the area before Ronaldo bagged his 23rd Serie A goal of the campaign from the penalty spot after being tripped by Luca Rossettini.

The hosts continued to impose their will on a tiring Lecce backline throughout the second period, and following goals from substitute Higuain and the ever-impressive De Ligt, Juve secured a routine 4-0 victory at the Allianz Stadium.

The result follows their 2-0 victory at Bologna last time out - where Danilo's late red card forced Blaise Matuidi into a left-back role for Friday night's encounter. The French Army Knife, however, excelled in an unfamiliar position.

The Lecce triumph is likely to be one of the final times we'll see Miralem Pjanic - who played the full 90 minutes - in a Juventus shirt. The declining Bosnian is set to be included in a swap deal with Barcelona which will see Arthur Melo arrive in Turin in exchange for Pjanic and €10m.