Saturday 16th March 2002

Vincenzo Montella scored two more goals as Roma maintained their charge for a second successive scudetto, beating Atalanta 3-1 at the Stadio Olimpico tonight.

If Roma's little aeroplane can keep up this level of performance then he's going to be causing some problems for Air Traffic Control.

Vavassori had been employing a 4-4-1-1 with Doni behind Rossini, but the gifted midfielder never had a chance to get forward and Atalanta's plans had to be changed when Falsini was injured in a clash with Montella and Pinardi was sent on as a replacement.

Capello kept up his use of heavy squad rotation for this game, leaving Batistuta and Emerson on the bench and deciding to leave Totti out of the squad. Cassano was given a start with Delvecchio and Montella up-front.

Any doubts about the wisdom of such a move were soon dispelled as Montella opened the scoring as early as the 18th minute, turning in an Assuncao free-kick off his knee

The result was sealed when Montella forced Carrera into scoring an own goal on the half-hour mark, Cassano's shot caused a complete misunderstanding between the defender and his goalkeeper, Massimo Taibi, and the mere presence of Montella was enough to produce a goal.

Vavassori must have used all of his powers of persuasion during the half-time team talk as Atalanta created some good chances at the start of the second half, Doni and Zauri both went close within the first five minutes of the re-start, but the aeroplanino was ready to take off again and he dropped another bomb on the visitors.

Cassano's header dropped straight to him and he had little difficult in slotting the ball past Taibi for his sixth league goal in the last two games. Cristiano Doni stole a late consolation goal for Atalanta but the result, despite leaving them in mid-table, puts them only 3-points off the drop zone.

The next two games for the champions, Tuesday night's Champions League game with Liverpool and next Sunday's Serie-A clash with Inter, could decide whether the rest of Roma will still be flying high or recovering from a crash landing.