Serie A | Sassuolo 3-1 Verona: Berardi back with a brace

Domenico Berardi made his ideal season debut for Sassuolo, bagging a brace after the Andrea Pinamonti header for their first points of the campaign, ending Verona’s perfect start.

Berardi was back in the squad for the first time this season after back issues and an attempt to join Juventus, but Maxime Lopez was suspended plus Agustin Alvarez injured. It had been a disastrous start for the Neroverdi, losing both games, yet Hellas were joint top with a 100 per cent record. Isak Hien sat out a ban, with Darko Lazovic, Jayden Braaf and Thomas Henry sidelined.

The first Sassuolo goal of the season arrived after 11 minutes, when Berardi’s effort was only cleared as far as Jeremie Toljan, whose cross found Andrea Pinamonti for the glancing header from six yards.

Ondrej Duda ballooned over from the edge of the area and Cyril Ngonge had an equaliser disallowed because Michael Folorunsho was offside before rolling across for the tap-in.

Verona also lost Martin Hongla to injury and Ngonge steered a free header off target, while Matheus Henrique’s dinked finish skimmed the far post after a give and go with Berardi.

Hellas did get their equaliser essentially by accident, because Ngonge cut inside from the right and tried to cross with his left foot, it went past everyone and into the far bottom corner.

However, Berardi marked his season debut with a goal, running onto the Armand Lauriente through ball and seeing the finish take a deflection off Diego Coppola’s knee to wrong-foot the ‘keeper.

Berardi then ran onto the Nedim Bajrami through ball and was bundled over by a clumsy Josh Doig for a penalty, which the captain calmly converted to complete his brace.

Bajrami almost made it 4-1 with an angled drive beaten away by Lorenzo Montipò at the near post and the goalkeeper out-did himself with a sensational one-handed save on Lauriente.

Sassuolo 3-1 Verona

Pinamonti 11 (S), Ngonge 56 (V), Berardi 64, 72 (S)