Inter salvage draw at Sampdoria; Roma smoke struggling Palermo
MILAN --
Inter Milan came from behind to rescue a 1-1 draw at Sampdoria and move provisionally top of Serie A on Sunday ahead of Fiorentina's match against Atalanta.
Inter dropped its first points of the season last week in a 4-1 loss to Fiorentina but avoided a second successive defeat when Ivan Perisic canceled out Luis Muriel's opener.
Roberto Mancini's side moved a point above Fiorentina. Roma was two points behind Inter after winning 4-2 at Palermo, while Lazio was two points further back ahead of its match against Frosinone.
Juventus was playing bottom club Bologna later looking for only its second win in seven matches, while Napoli was visiting AC Milan.
Elsewhere, Sassuolo saw its unbeaten run end with a 1-0 loss at Empoli and Udinese drew 1-1 against Genoa. Udinese striker Antonio Di Natale, who had his head heavily bandaged following an earlier collision, scored his 208th Serie A goal.
Inter was looking to get back on track after seeing its perfect start to the season shattered last week but it was Sampdoria which had the best of the first-half chances and Joaquin Correa had the worst miss of the season in the 38th minute.
Correa was one-on-one with Samir Handanovic and his effort took a lucky ricochet off the Inter goalkeeper to leave the Argentine midfielder in front of an open goal but he incredibly sent his effort wide of the far post from two yards out.
Muriel atoned for his teammate's error early in the second half, volleying in a cross from 17-year-old Pedro Pereira.
Inter leveled 14 minutes from time in somewhat chaotic fashion. Mauro Icardi's volley took a double ricochet but he was able to prod the rebound into the path of Perisic, who poked it into the bottom corner for his first Serie A goal.
Roma was looking to bounce back from a 3-2 loss to BATE Borisov in the Champions League and Miralem Pjanic gave it the lead after just 108 seconds, rolling the ball into the bottom right corner after a one-two with Alessandro Florenzi.
The pair combined for another goal in the 14th minute when Pjanic's scuffed shot turned into an assist for Florenzi.
Roma was 3-0 up inside the half hour mark when Gervinho dribbled along the edge of the penalty area before curling a delightful effort into the top right corner.
Palermo almost got one back immediately but Franco Vazquez headed Aleksandar Trajkovski's free kick off the crossbar.
Alberto Gilardino came on at halftime and reduced the deficit with his first goal for Palermo.
Giancarlo Gonzalez thought he had re-opened the match when he scored early in injury time but Gervinho secured the points with his second of the match.
