Mattia Valoti put in a superb performance which epitomised the hard work of his SPAL team as they ran out 2-1 winners during Monday evenings Serie A fixture at the Gewiss Stadium.
As a result, SPAL have picked up a vital three points in their fight against relegation and go one point behind Lecce who sit in 17th. For Atalanta, they are now three points off of Roma who sit in 4th.
La Dea went ahead after 16 minutes when Duvan Zapata pulled the ball back across goal and Josip Ilicic flicked home with a cheeky back heel for his 10th goal of the campaign.
SPAL responded by putting pressure on the Atalanta defence before half time and were unlucky not to have went level when Andrea Petagna hit the post with a glancing header.
Shortly after the break, Petagna would be rewarded, they got the ball forward quickly and caught Atalanta napping when Arkadiusz Reca raced on to a long ball from Igor Julio and he pulled the ball back for Petagna to slot home the equaliser.
Minutes later, SPAL would strike again and this time it was Valoti who scored. After winning the ball back in Atalanta’s half, Bryan Dabo ran into space and played the ball into Valoti who flicked it over one defender and danced past a couple more Atalanta players and struck well into the bottom corner.
From then on, SPAL were up against waves of Atalanta attacks but they had an answer for everything that was flung at them as they left Bergamo with a huge three points.
Source: forzaitalianfootball.com