Empoli 0 - 0 AS Roma: Second-placed Roma held to goalless draw at Serie A strugglers Empoli

Roma blew their chance to keep the pressure on Serie A leaders Juventus as they were held to a goalless draw at struggling Empoli on Sunday.

Luciano Spalletti's side had hoped to get the distance between themselves and their title rivals back to two points after Juve had opened up a five-point gap with victory over Napoli on Saturday night.

But their bid for a fifth consecutive league win was scuppered by a mixture of poor finishing and inspired goalkeeping from on-loan Lukasz Skorupski, who was playing against his parent club.

Skorupski produced a brilliant stretching save to deny Edin Dzeko in the opening moments, then also dived well to keep out a close-range effort from Mohamed Salah.

Manuel Pasqual went close to grabbing a shock lead for the hosts towards half-time when he whizzed a free-kick just wide of Roma goalkeeper Wojciech Szczesny's upright.

Manuel Pucciarelli also missed the first chance of the second half for the home side before Skorupski was called on again to keep out a header from Kostas Manolas.

An increasingly busy Szczesny was then forced to save from Massimo Maccarone and, despite a chance for Bruno Peres, it was the hosts who continued to push.

Riccardo Saponara had Szczesny stretching to keep out his low shot and Maccarone missed the target again heading into the final 10 minutes.

But Empoli were finally forced to withstand significant pressure in the dying minutes with Dzeko twice coming close to breaking the deadlock and Paredes and Stephan El Shaarawy also going close.