Cristiano Ronaldo Douglas Costa Juventus Cagliari Serie A 03112018MARCO BERTORELLO

Ronaldo's Juventus off to best ever Serie A start

Cristiano Ronaldo may not have found the net for Juventus on Saturday, but the Portugal star has helped his new club to their best-ever start to a Serie A season. 

The Bianconeri were unbeaten going into the weekend's clash at home to Cagliari, having won nine of their opening 10 fixtures. 

And they had few problems in dispatching the Sardinians to uphold a six-point lead over nearest rivals Napoli and Inter.

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Paulo Dybala gave the reigning champions the lead inside the first minute, his second goal of the Serie A season. 

Having scored just 42 seconds in, it was the quickest goal scored by Juventus in Serie A play in exactly six years, with Arturo Vidal having scored 18 seconds into a November 2, 2012 match against Inter. 

Joao Pedro's equaliser briefly gave the visitors hope, but Juve hit back almost instantly when Filip Bradaric put past his own keeper. 

The victory was made certain by Juan Cuadrado, who came off the bench to seal a 3-1 scoreline. 

Juve's points tally of 31 after 11 games is also level with the all-time high for the start of a campaign in Italy's top flight, equalling previous best tallies posted by Roma and Napoli. 

Curiously, neither of those sides went on to win the Scudetto in 2013/14 and 2017/18, the years in which they set the record. 

Ronaldo, meanwhile, sits in second place in the top scorer charts despite his blank against Cagliari, his seven goals putting him behind only Krzysztof Piatek who failed to add to his nine off the bench for Genoa as his side were thrashed 5-0 by Inter.
 

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