Serie A | Bologna 2-1 Genoa: Castro magic and last-gasp Orsolini decisive

A moment of Santiago Castro magic and contentious Riccardo Orsolini penalty at the 99^th minute gave Bologna victory over Genoa.

The Rossoblu were stuttering so far this season with a win over Como splitting narrow defeats at Roma and Milan. Ciro Immobile, Nicolò Casale, Ibrahim Sulemana and Tommaso Pobega were still out of action, with Emil Holm returning to the bench. Genoa were without a win, but held Como to a last-gasp draw. Jean Onana and Maxwel Cornet remained on the treatment table.

See how it all unfolded on the Liveblog.

It was almost the perfect start for the hosts, who had the ball in the net after 90 seconds, but Santiago Castro was offside for the diving header on Federico Bernardeschi’s cross.

Devis Vasquez scuffed a finish into Lukasz Skorupski’s arms on a short corner, while Nikola Moro and Bernardeschi had shots charged down in the same move.

Skorupski made a fantastic reaction save on 35 minutes to palm the Aaron Martin strike over the bar from just inside the area, while Riccardo Orsolini flashed an angled drive across the face of goal after a stepover.

Leo Ostigard went off after a knock to the ribs, but Skorupski made a desperate double save on Mikael Ellertsson (who was offside anyway) and the Colombo follow-up.

Moments later, the goalkeeper rushed outside his box to nod clear from Ellertsson, while Orsolini horribly wasted the finish after putting himself in an ideal position.

Ellertsson remained a constant menace, his cross to the back post nodded onto the side-netting by Vitinha.

It was only a warning, as Genoa did open the scoring 30 seconds later when Ellertsson surged down the right in a give and go with Ruslan Malinovskyi, surprising Skorupski with a ferocious finish at the near post.

Bologna threatened an equaliser moments later, Nicola Leali flying to palm the Santiago Castro header out from under the bar on Nadir Zortea’s cross.

Castro drew the hosts level with a moment of magic from the Nicolò Cambiaghi low cross from the left, managing to flick it into the far bottom corner on the turn from six yards with the outside of the right boot.

Bologna nearly turned it around completely at the 90^th minute with a powerful Orsolini header that smacked against the underside of the bar and bounced back out off the ground.

Deep into stoppages, a corner was nodded down onto the arm of Valentin Carboni, and after a very long VAR review, the penalty was given for handball. Orsolini kept his cool to send Leali the wrong way and win it late on, but Genoa coach Patrick Vieira saw red for dissent.

Bologna 2-1 Genoa

Ellertsson 63 (G), Castro 73 (B), Orsolini pen 99 (B)