UPDATE 1-Soccer-Five-star Napoli hammer lowly Pescara

ROME, Dec 2 (Reuters) - Napoli kept pace with Juventus at the top of Serie A after thumping bottom-of-the-table Pescara 5-1 at home on Sunday.

Two goals from Gokhan Inler and Edison Cavani and another from Marek Hamsik moved Napoli onto 33 points from 15 games, two behind the league leaders who beat Torino 3-0 on Saturday in the Turin derby.

Napoli put pressure on Pescara right from the start and after going close with long-range strikes from Lorenzo Insigne and Hamsik, Inler opened the scoring on nine minutes with another rasping shot from distance that flew past Mattia Perin in the Pescara goal.

Walter Mazzarri's side doubled their lead six minutes later through Hamsik when, after smart approach play from Insigne, the Slovak was left to lift the ball over defender Antonio Bocchetti before scuffing a shot past a furious Perin.

Despite being completely second best, Pescara quickly pulled a goal back when Icelander Birkir Bjarnason evaded Napoli's dozing defence to head home from Damiano Zanon's teasing cross.

The goal gave Pescara hope that they could get something at their title-chasing hosts, while Napoli's play became nervy and scrappy with Mazzarri visibly irritated on the sidelines.

However, after Perin stopped a close-range Cavani volley on 56 minutes, the Uruguayan restored Napoli's two-goal lead from the penalty spot a minute later.

After being fed by Insigne, he tried to dribble his way past three Pescara defenders before being tripped in the box by Bocchetti, who capped off a miserable game by being sent off.

Cavani dusted himself down to calmly stroke the spot kick home to make it 3-1 and he put the result beyond any doubt five minutes later, racing onto Hamsik's inviting pass across the six-metre box to smash home his 10th league goal of the season.

Napoli were not finished though and Inler scored his second of the game and third of the season with 12 minutes left, smashing another spectacular strike past Perin to keep the pressure on Antonio Conte's champions.

"We have to carry on with the same attitude as we had in the second half, because honestly we played badly at the end of the first half and that angered me," Cavani, who many are tipping to break Maradona's club record of 115 goals, told Italian TV.

"If I can get there, I'll look to score even more goals. However, I don't look at others, only this group of players in which I play my part and my own performance.

"We're not thinking about whether we can challenge Juventus or not, we're just going our own way, we'll see where we come and I hope that we'll be up there."

Inter Milan will be hoping to arrest their rotten recent run of form and get their title challenge back on track with a win at home to Palermo later (1400 GMT).

Surprise packages Fiorentina will too have the chance to close the gap on Juve in Sunday's late game with Sampdoria (1945 GMT). (Editing by Mark Meadows; mark.meadows@thomsonreuters.com; +44 20 7542 7933; Reuters Messaging:; mark.meadows.reuters.com@reuters.net)