Football: Batistuta achieves treble top

EUROPEAN FOOTBALL

GABRIEL BATISTUTA grabbed his second hat-trick of the season as Fiorentina came from behind to beat 10-man Cagliari 4-2 in Italy's Serie A yesterday, writes Gideon Long.

The Argentinian hit man took his tally for the season to 17 goals in as many league games and propelled Giovanni Trapattoni's team back to the top of the table.

Batistuta opened the scoring with a powerful header, but Cagliari equalised through the Uruguayan defender, Fabian O'Neill. The Sardinian side had their new signing Cristiano Zanetti sent off after the break for a second bookable offence but they took the lead through Tiziano De Patre.

Fiorentina looked out of sorts as Cagliari squandered two good chances to wrap up an improbable away victory, but Edmundo pulled the home side back into the match with a left-foot shot following a rampaging run, and Batistuta struck two late goals to seal the points.

Milan's goalkeeper, Sebastiano Rossi, was sent off for throwing a punch in the final minute against Perugia at San Siro, but the home side held on to win 2-1 after Hidetoshi Nakata converted the penalty awarded for Rossi's offence.

The Argentinian striker Andres Guglielminpietro scored his first goal for Milan since his arrival in the close season and Oliver Bierhoff added their second. The Perugia players had to take a fleet of taxis to San Siro after their coach suffered a puncture. The kick-off was delayed by 13 minutes as a result.

Brazil's Ronaldo picked up a booking as Internazionale went down 2-0 at Bologna, whose first goal came from a controversial penalty converted by Giuseppe Signori. Davide Fontolan headed Bologna's second.

Francesco Pedone gave the bottom club, Venezia, an unexpected early lead against Juventus, who earned a point thanks to Daniel Fonseca's second- half goal. The Turin club's new Argentinian signing, Juan Esnaider, made a second-half appearance as the French World Cup men Didier Deschamps and Zinedine Zidane were both substituted.

In Spain, Real beat Atletico 4-2 in the Madrid derby, watched by 70,000 at the Bernabeu. Fernando Morientes scored twice for the home side while Juninho was on target once for Atletico.

Celta Vigo took over at the top of the Primera Division with a 4-2 home win over the previous leaders, Real Mallorca. Valery Karpin scored twice for the Galician club, who were twice in arrears.

In France, Marseilles kept their three-point lead in the league by snatching a 1-1 draw with a late goal by a substitute, Titi Camara, at Rennes. Second- placed Bordeaux, down to 10 men from the 38th minute when the defender Francois Grenet was sent off, also came from behind to draw 1-1 at Montpellier.