Inter take their first win in the Serie A since beating Fiorentina on the 26th of September, after seeing off Hellas Verona 4 goals to 2 at the Stadio Giuseppe Meazza in San Siro after a fantastic start to the game where the team scored twice before the first quarter of an hour had passed. 

Right there I’d hoped to be able to finish this post-match editorial but the duration of a football match is for 90 minutes, for good and worse depending on which supporters of which team you ask. Today, I subscribe to the group who’d like to have seen the match end then and there, when Inter put pressure on an indolent Hellas Verona who looked like a group of fans of the Swedish nationalteam who had wandered on to the pitch by mistake. Because if the match had ended there, Inter would leave the match with a feeling that the team destroyed Hellas Verona and that we’re back to winning ways due to complete and utter superiority.

In terms of play Inter were superior, goalwise we should have been and we would have been if it wasn’t for the headless chicken farm known better as “Inter’s cetral defense”, Rolando excluded who in fact aside from his goal looked stable and safe with the ball as well as making some crucial interceptions and ball-winning tackles. Juan Jesus and Ranocchia however, seem to want to break some kind of unofficial World Record in clumsiness when they both push forward to mark Luca Toni who seef of the challenge from both of them thanks to his fantastic physique and combines with Martinho who races off and makes no mistake when alone with Carrizo. Juan and Ranocchia have now played together for almost a year and a half and during this time they HAVE to have made a decision as to WHO does WHAT in these types of situations, meaning who pushes up and who goes deep. Hellas Verona score another goal after yet another poor decision by Juan due to indecisiveness when he firstly is far too late to assist Ranocchia with marking Luca Toni, which leads to Toni winning the challenge easily and playing a simple pass to Romulo who is free to finish the chance distinctively in Carrizo’s bottom lefthand corner.

Once again there is a lack of communication and the interaction between Juan and Ranocchia is abysmal which leads to Juan coming in late to both situations. Ranocchia gave a very uneven performance today although he was far more stable than he’s been for the past few games however it must be said that he had great problems marking a Luca Toni in peak condition, but on the other hand which team in the Serie A wouldn’t struggle with Toni in all honesty? Especially when considering the fact that the former Fiorentina man’s performances have raised voices asking Prandelli to give him another chance for the Azzurri. Toni’s great form aside it isn’t ok for Inter to have conceded 8 goals in the last 3 Serie A fixtures. Sure, 3 of those goals were against league leaders Roma but with all due respect for Torino and Hellas Verona these teams lack the attacking quality to score 5 times against Inter, irrespective of if Campagnaro is playing or not.

Thank heavens the rest of the team were in form where the midfield trio of Cambiasso, Alvarez and Guarin were very aggressive and together with Kovacic in the trequartista role and Palacio up front, they put so much pressure on the Hellas defenders that they conceded twice. Cambiasso was fantastic as an anchor in front of Inters defense and the dynamic duo of Guarin and Alvarez chased the life out of Verona’s midfielders. But four performance stood out tonight:

  • It was wonderful to see Fredy Guarin’s ‘never-say-die’ attitude tonight but mostly it was very reassuring to see how he never sulked or moped when making a mistake. Instead he ran even more in order to retain possession and gave a solid performance all things considered.
  • Jonathan may still not cut it when faced with teams like Juventus but when playing teams of a lesser quality he’s been delivering top performances in pretty much every single game he’s played. Today he was behind another good goal as his shot which led to Inter’s second goal was judged to have been an owngoal.
  • Yuto Nagotomo’s neverending stamina is a joy to behold. How does he just keep running up and down the pitch like that for 90 minutes?! The run, the dribblings and the shot which led to Inter’s third goal were brilliant and I really don’t begrudge him all the success in the world running up and down Inter’s left-flank. He certainly deserves it.
  • Mateo Kovacic looked like he was feeling good tonight. Sure he wasn’t involved in the teams build-up due to his position as trequartista higher up on the pitch but whenever he got the ball tonight he looked anything but tired or worn out. I don’t think theres anyone I would like to see score a goal for his club as much as Mateo Kovacic.

Our attack is looking very sharp at the minute and Rodrigo Palacio is a fantastic footballer to watch with his sacrificing defensive runs as well as his runs and nose for goalscoring opportunities when going forward, which makes him the most important Inter player, together with Hugo Campagnaro of course, who hopefully will be back for at least one of the two difficult away fixtures this coming week starting with Atalanta on Tuesday and Udinese on Sunday afternoon.