Buoyant Milan aim to stretch lead at Serie A top
Buoyant Milan aim to stretch lead at Serie A top
AC Milan turn their attention back to Serie A following a dominant Champions League victory against Arsenal.

Milan: It is a buoyant AC Milan side which heads to Cesena on Sunday as they turns their attention back to Serie A following a dominant Champions League victory against Arsenal.

Milan are all but through to the quarter-finals after humiliating the Premier League side 4-0 in the first leg. They also remain top of Serie A after Juventus drew 0-0 at Parma on Wednesday.

"We can win both the Champions League and the title, we're stronger than Juventus," club owner Silvio Berlusconi said. "The Champions League is a difficult competition, because there are great teams in it. I think we have to win the league and then if we go really far in the Champions League, that would be a great thing."

"I would like to win the Coppa Italia, because we have not won it for a long time. A treble for Milan would be a good sign for the future."

Star striker Zlatan Ibrahimovic will miss the Cesena match as he serves the second of his three-match ban for striking an opponent. Kevin-Prince Boateng's return from four weeks out with injury is a timely one and he was in sparkling form against Arsenal.

Christian Abbiati, Alessandro Nesta, Alexandre Pato, Mathieu Flamini and Mario Yepes also all returned to training this week as Milan's injury woes finally relent.

Cesena currently prop up the table with Novara and have only won once in their past nine games. Milan sit a point above unbeaten Juventus, who play host to Catania on Saturday evening.

Several of Juventus' recent games have been disrupted by the weather. Antonio Conte's team played one of their two games in hand against Parma and were widely expected to win and move back top.

However, despite dominating possession, they could not find the back of the net and were forced to settle for a point after having two decent penalty shouts turned down, leaving Conte fuming.

"I've already seen this situation before," the Juve coach said. "I think they're scared to give penalties to Juve. If you don't blow your whistle for Juve, you don't make a mistake, if you make a mistake against Juve nothing happens. We want to be treated equally."

"I don't want to talk about a single incidence but of an alarming statistic. We spend 70-75 minutes in our opponents' half and up to now we're the team that has had the fewest penalties in total. It's impossible that after 22 rounds of leading Serie A there isn't a team until you get to the Lega Pro (third division), which has had less penalties than us."

Elsewhere, Lazio have sneaked up on the top after three victories in four games and currently sit third, five points off Milan. They visit Palermo on Sunday, while Udinese - a point further back - welcome Cagliari.

Inter Milan seemed to be back in the title race a month ago after a stunning run. But an equally appalling streak of three defeats and a draw, as well as being knocked out the Italian Cup by Napoli, leaves them with the prospect of ending the season trophyless - unless they can pull off something spectacular when they resume their Champions League campaign against Marseille in the last-16 next week.

Inter host struggling Bologna on Friday. Napoli, the other Italian team in the Europe's elite competition, travel to Fiorentina.

Rock-bottom Novara resurrected their faint hopes of survival when they triumphed 1-0 at Inter last weekend and another victory at home to Atalanta could leave them just three points off safety.

The other team in the relegation zone, Lecce, entertain Siena in Sunday's early kick-off.

Elsewhere on Sunday it's - Genoa vs Chievo; and Roma vs Parma.

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