Inter played Napoli today in what felt like a fantastic test in terms of defending proving that we can and will compete to become the champions of Italy. Today Inter showed many positive points along with a few negative points and how they can improve a few aspects to make them a completely better team. I think that defensively this was probably one of Inter’s best individual performances. What I mean by individual performances is that each player in the back line played a near perfect game in shutting down Napoli’s deadly striking power.
First of all we start with D’Ambrosio, today he probably played his best game of the year by far and personally I was convinced that Insigne would have been able to expose him but he stopped him nearly every single time. When he did get beat, he made sure to bust back and put an end to whatever threat Insigne was trying to pose.
Before I give praise to Miranda and Skriniar I must absolutely give credit where credit is due. Nagatomo played a very strong game defensively he was able to stop Callejon and Allan for most of the game, I will not say he played a perfect game but he definitely was able to hold his ground in a game where I thought he would easily be weak link. I tip my hat to his performance all though he played well, theres always room for improvement. With that being said I can’t help but think how Dalbert would have reacted to defending Napoli’s right side.
The way Miranda played this game was slightly different in my opinion, I feel like he did a great job at working as a kind of clean up crew for all the balls pushed a touch to far behind Nagatomo and D’Ambrosio and he did a fantastic job at doing so, then again, I didn’t expect anything less.
Finally, Skriniar, by far the best defender for us today. That man is fearless and relentless. Every single opportunity he stepped up to the attacking players and defended them perfectly whether it was boxing them towards the outside or his signature standing tackle that he performs so well. Both center backs complimented themselves beautifully, all very positive aspects.
A midfielder that really caught my eye was Vecino, he was able to get involved in the short passes, he was always moving as an option and he did a fantastic job in carrying the ball up the field burning the midfield on several occasions, unfortunately they all came up short.
The reason for the draw I think was that we let Napoli dictate the pace of the game which is exactly what they do best. If we would have played at our own pace and stuck to our own plan instead of relying on our rock solid defence and our counter attack I think the outcome would have been different.
