Inter head coach Simone Inzaghi believes that his team played well enough to earn a point away to Torino this evening, though not necessarily any more.
Speaking to Italian broadcaster DAZN after the match, the coach acknowledged that the Nerazzurri had not really went into the match with the right tactical approach and paid for it by dropping two precious points in the Scudetto race.
Inter never looked fully comfortable against a well-organized Torino side who used their aggressive press to impose their preferred tempo on proceedings.
The Granata went ahead early on from a corner after a defensive mix-up by Inter, and the Nerazzurri had to wait until several minutes into stoppage time at the end to snatch an equalizing goal through Alexis Sanchez.
In between, both teams had some decent chances to score, but on the balance Inzaghi watched his team have to settle for a draw away to tough opposition.
“There were many situations in the match,” he said. “In the first half, Toro was aggressive and could have scored from a corner, while Berisha made two excellent saves.”
“In the first 25 minutes, we took to the pitch with a different balance,” he went on. “We deserved to equalize earlier, in which case we could have gone on to win.”
“But I’m not happy with our approach,” the coach added, “we had to do more. To win the Scudetto you need to approach these kinds of matches better.”
Inzaghi continued that “We have lost strength, energy, and key players at a crucial moment of the season. But it shouldn’t be an excuse, we can do better.”
He went on that “We have ten finals to go plus the second leg of the Coppa Italia semi-final, we need to recover as much strength and key players as possible.”
“But this particular match came after a very compressed period of games,” he continued. “Now we have to regain our energy and get better results. We have to face these ten finals one at a time.”
“We’ve dipped in form,” the coach admitted, “but there are no worries. We have the opportunity to train more and better now, and we must optimize our strength by analyzing why we haven’t gotten good results in recent matches.”
“There is physical and mental fatigue,” he went on, “we are Inter and we can do better. Our approach was not good but then we created a lot.”
“We knew where we were starting from,” he said of the pressure of the title race, “and we caused everyone to change how they viewed us, which we’re proud of.”
He added that “There are many strong and well-equipped teams at the top of the table, some have had more time to prepare but we don’t hold back. We’ll face these ten finals in the best possible way, then we’ll see what happens.”
“The two-legged tie against Liverpool took away some of our physical and mental energy,” the coach said, “but we wanted it with all our strength and between the two matches a sense of great regret remains.”
Of the sending off of Alexis Sanchez against Liverpool for two yellow cards, he said that “I take great care regarding yellow cards, but at that moment he was giving us a lot.”
He said that it is “Difficult for a coach to make substitutions, but those were the same players with whom we won the Supercoppa against Juve. We have to take responsibility.”
On the possible penalty committed by defender Andrea Ranocchia on Granata striker Andrea Belotti during the match, Inzaghi said that “There’s his foot, the ball, the referee is there. He had to make a decision, but I don’t want to talk about it, I’ve already paid for talking about these things with a suspension after Juve.”
And on the Serie A title race, he said that “We and a lot of other teams are breathing life into a very exciting season.”
