Richie Porte and Team Sky negotiated a tricky third stage at the Giro d'Italia to remain firmly in the general classification fight.

The Ligurian hills played host to a stage packed with climbs and as a result it was a reduced peloton that sprinted it out for the win in Sestri Levante.

Porte was again surrounded by his team-mates with he, Mikel Nieve, Leopold Konig and Kanstantsin Siutsou making it over the second-category Barbagelata climb in the bunch.

At the finish it was the maglia rosa of Michael Matthews who prevailed, with the Australian (Orica-GreenEdge) sprinting to victory and extending his race lead to 10 seconds.

The balance swung between a sizeable breakaway and the peloton during a short, sharp 136km test, but the race came back together in the final kilometres after Tinkoff-Saxo had paced almost the entire stage.

Porte now sits 37 seconds behind Matthews as he continues to climb up the general classification in the first week. Elia Viviani also held onto the points jersey after spending the stage resplendent in the maglia rosso.

The equal shortest stage of the race proved tempting for a number of riders and teams, with 25 men heading up the road during a rapid start to the stage.

Salvatore Puccio rode his way into the move to cover it on behalf of Team Sky, but the group began to split up over the tough terrain and the Italian dropped back into the peloton ahead of the Barbagelata.

The subsequent descent saw a nasty crash for GC contender Domenico Pozzovivo, with the Ag2r-La Mondiale rider sliding out on a corner and taken to hospital, thankfully in a stable condition.

Despite a motivated group of escapees and a solo attack from Pavel Kochetkov (Katusha), the race came back together in the final kilometres for a sprint.

After the stage Sports Director Dario Cioni confirmed: "It was a pretty hard stage today. The roads were really twisting and turning all day and the break went from the gun. The peloton was then chasing straight away so it wasn't easy for anyone out there.

"Salva followed a group when it went and got into the break. You never know what can happen and if the race explodes then you have an extra rider up the road. It was a good move to be in.

"We got through the stage without any issues and we always had guys around Richie. Tomorrow's stage should be a bit of a repeat of what we've seen today - with another difficult finish."