A second-half leveller from former Sunderland striker Emanuele Giaccherini dented 10-man Fiorentina's Serie A title hopes in a 1-1 draw at the Renato Dall'Ara stadium on Saturday.

Fiorentina, whose only 'scudetto' came in 1969, were firmly among the title contenders in Italy's top flight prior to the festive break following a spectacular start to the season.

But a series of patchy results since then have seen Paulo Sousa's men lose some of their early season punch.

Saturday's draw means La Viola have now won just three of their past seven games in 2016.

Although Fiorentina remain third they could be 10 points behind leaders Napoli, who host struggling Carpi, by Sunday afternoon and drop to fourth if Inter Milan win at Verona.

Sousa, who was sitting out a one-game touchline ban, left his top scorers Nikola Kalinic and Josip Ilicic on the bench for the short visit north and it took the visitors over half an hour to muster a shot on goal.

Former Barcelona winger Cristian Tello did well to break away on the left but Angelo Da Costa parried his angled shot from close range.

Soon after, Senegal striker Khouma Bababar ballooned over from eight yards with the goal at his mercy.

Sousa replaced Babacar with Kalinic at the interval but Fiorentina's hopes of taking all three points suffered a blow when Matias Fernandez, who had been cautioned after just three minutes, saw red for a needless shove from behind on Domenico Maietta 12 minutes after the restart.

Fiorentina broke the deadlock only two minutes later, Federico Bernardeschi pouncing on Tello's low drive across the area to beat Da Costa first-time from 12 yards to claim his maiden goal in Serie A.

But Bologna struck back almost immediately with a similar effort, Giaccherini driving his first-timer from Godfred Donsah's superb delivery inside the area past Ciprian Tatarusanu in the visitors' net.

Later Saturday Lazio visit Genoa hoping for a morale-boosting win a day after being hit with a 50,000 euros fine as punishment for their fans' racially taunting Napoli defender Kalidou Koulibaly in midweek.

The remaining fixtures will be played Sunday, when champions Juventus will aim to maintain their two-point deficit to Napoli away to league strugglers Frosinone.

A win for Inter Milan away to basement side Verona, who claimed their first win of the season last week, would see Roberto Mancini's men move up to third to take a one-point lead on Fiorentina.