Elated by their Derby d’Italia win over Juventus, Inter travel North to Udine to face the other top-flight team in black and white, Udinese, hoping to build back their momentum. Match today Saturday at 18:00CET.

With the Derby d’Italia behind them, Inter need to get back to consistently racking up the points if they are to continue applying the pressure on league leaders Milan. A potentially problematic trip to Udine is the first stop for the Nerazzurri.

Winless in eight matches, Udinese go into the match in pretty shoddy form, the Zebretti had started the season quite poorly but a spurt of decent results where they beat Genoa, Lazio and Torino in quick succession turned out to be nothing but a false dawn.

Despite their form and league position, Udinese have the league’s ninth best defense, six positions higher than their actual position on the table.

Coach Luca Gotti has built a side that plays a simple uncomplicated brand of football that can easily frustrate the bigger sides.

With Udinese likely to mirror Inter’s 3-5-2 formation, attacking runs by midfielders into spaces between the opponent’s lines whether centrally or on the flanks will likely be the key to unlock the match.

Expect Antonio Conte to ask both Nicolo Barella and Arturo Vidal to continue popping up in the box as they did against Juve.

Inter need to know that Udinese will want nothing out of this match except to frustrate the visitors. Accordingly, if the visitors are going to win, they need to respect their opponents and not try and rush the outcome keeping in mind that their quality will shine through eventually.

Team News

Inter travel to Udine with a near full squad with only Danilo D’Ambrosio out due to his continued injury.

Probable Line-up (3-5-2): Handanovic (C); Skriniar, De Vrij, Bastoni; Hakimi, Vidal, Brozovic, Barella, Young; Lautaro, Lukaku

Stats

Last Season: Udinese 0 – 2 Inter.

Last 10 Head to Head: Inter hold a dominant upper hand over Udinese in the head to head department with eight wins to the hosts’ sole win.

Keep an Eye on:

Lautaro Martinez: All eyes have been on the young Argentine for all the wrong reasons the past couple of weeks. Lautaro has been unable to put the ball in the back of the net despite having been presented with a plethora of chances for four matches in a row.

Lauti needs to improve his finishing and conversion rates if he is to fulfill his potential. It is fine to be a middling striker with a low teens scoring tally per season, but the expectation the Inter faithful have placed on Lautaro is far beyond becoming just an adequate striker and Lautaro needs to be far more consistent if he is to develop into a world class scorer.

Officials

Referee: Fabio Maresca.

Assistants: Imperiale and Di Vuolo.

Fourth Official: Fourneau.

VAR: Aureliano and Mondin.

Prediction & Concluding Remarks

Prediction & scorers: Udinese 1 – 3 Inter Lukaku, Lautaro and Vidal to win it.

Concluding remarks: It is a great morale boost to finally beat Juventus, but Conte knows very well that all three points are equal in value when it comes to the league table.

Inter cannot underestimate the importance of this match and must enter the pitch as prepared and ready as they were against Juve.