Inter Benfica – Tiscali Sport

There weren’t many doubts, the two-to-zero in the safe was already a fairly substantial nest egg from which to start again. But Inter didn’t live on income, and this is an important sign in the continuation of the Champions League, because it gives the idea of ​​a group aware of its strengths. Three to three in the end, but the final draw is not misleading. As long as the Nerazzurri were on the ball, the 3-1 was even tight for them. Then they remembered how they play, resting, on Sundays. Done.

After a first half of European level and ideas, with high pressing and the will to scare Benfica chose the old Italian game in the second half, but always developing it with great intensity without ever slowing down the pace. Inter returning to the upper floors of Europe is a team that is not afraid but scary, that seeks spaces to occupy them and not just to throw cursors like darts and then let them take care of it. His strength is not in individuals, but in the group. Nothing to do with the stunted, almost indifferent championship. We had to judge the derby that awaits us from these quarter-finals, the only euro we have we would bet on Inter, not only because we liked them more than Milan, but above all because they never make a mistake when these challenges have to be faced (do we want to recognize this at least in Inzaghi?). Until she secured the result against Benfica, she was almost perfect. Then, having achieved their goal, Inter returned to Serie A. It can stay there.

Festive mood from the start

The festive air for the semifinal with attached derby was already in the air before the match. And not just for the comforting two to zero brought home from Lisbon. When they hear the Champions League tune, Inter transforms, barricaded in their manor, ready to strike their imprudent opponent beyond the moat with quick and lethal bites. In Europe, he kept six clean sheets out of nine matches, 7 goals conceded, 4 from Nagelsmann’s aggressive Bayern and the remaining three in the vibrant draw at the Camp Nou with Barcelona, ​​the real challenge of the turning point, the one that gave the right certainties to Inzaghi and his troops. On the other side there is Roger Schmitd’s new Benfica, who made money in the January transfer market by selling half the team, including his star, Enzo Fernandez, 120 million in dowry and an unfillable void from midfield up. The Red Eagles (Aguias Encarnados), as they are called in Portugal, have nothing to do with this autumn’s steamrollers, with their ginseng pressing and sudden gusts: if they never lost before, now they are collecting defeats in series , and the last one against the modest Chaves, favored by a rossolano mistake by Otamendi, has also reopened the championship which already seemed to be fully armored.

Il Benfica has lost in addition to its suffocating pace, it has also lost many of its certainties. Can a team like this still be scary, even forced to come back two goals? Of course not. San Siro feels it and Inter also understands it, which presents, apart from Skriniar, the best formation these days, with Lukaku ready to take over from Dzeko in the second half.

Barella opens the scoring

The wave of the match can be seen from the beginning, with Benfica throwing themselves forward with their heads bowed and the Nerazzurri launching themselves into the spaces because they have no intention of thinking only of defending themselves: in the 5th minute Lautaro goes off to the prairies and Di Marco needs a ball of gold, who is there, alone in front of the goalkeeper, but doesn’t catch the ball with slightly lopsided movements. Another seven minutes, and Barella exchanges with Lautaro and when he receives in the area he gets rid of a defender and lets loose a slap with effect to be placed at the crossroads: one to zero. It’s only been 14 minutes. And it didn’t end there. Benfica know they have to play the game, but they don’t understand much. Who understands everything is Inter. In the 16th minute Di Marco crosses, and Vlachodimos stutters with the ball with Dzeko who is there ready to strike, saving himself only in extremis. The Portuguese took the hit. They expected an Inter closed in his area, thinking only of defending himself, Milan style, but these here instead bite them into all the clods of the field and as soon as they can they leave again with five or six men. The dribbling of the Lusitanians is confused, they look for filtered shots and quick triangulations, everything they could do in the past and which now gets caught up in the sequence of his mistakes. They become dangerous only on a free-kick from the edge of Grimaldo, with a plastic save by Onana diving to his left. Inter instead builds, Di Marco smoothes his armband and Mkhtaryan arms Barella and Dumfriess on the other. And he scores again: a cross from Dzeko and Lautaro headers after having pushed Gilberto from behind. But the referee canceled: for him that push was stronger than it seemed. Then you know how football is made: sometimes it’s incomprehensible. While Inter are in total control of the game, here’s the flash you don’t expect: Rafa, left free between the lines, throws a ball into the area that Aursnes bags under the crossbar, detaching very well from Dumfries. One-on-one doesn’t really make sense of the challenge, because in the middle there were other chances for Inter, a goal from Bastoni that was rejected by Goncalo Ramos, a wrong shot, despite the unobstructed view ahead, from Mkhtaryan, who also tried the personal conclusion, between one fan and another to launch Barella, the man everywhere of the Nerazzurri. On the other hand, only Grimaldo’s goal and free-kick.

Inter dominates, Benfica draws

The second half begins as the first half began, with Lautaro, now in great shape, who strikes up to a stone’s throw from the area and lets loose a violent lap shot that grazes the intersection. After a hint at the start of putting pressure on the Lusitanians, Inzaghi’s men seem to decide to retire to their own estates. Perhaps it is the situation that Benfica prefers, so that they are not forced to build, a task in which they do not really excel tonight, being able to advance calmly to throw crosses into the area. On one of these there is a dubious intervention by Lautaro, which the referee does not consider. But even so, holed up in the home half of the pitch, if there’s a team that can hurt, it’s always Inter. First Dzeko hits a cross from Bastoni with his head, the ball goes to the bottom. Then Lautaro picks up Di Marco’s half-height offer in a rush and scores the 2-1. It’s 65′. Again Di Marco came close to scoring with a right foot sent back to the da Silva goal. Then Correa, as soon as he entered, jumped Otamendi sharply and kicked around, a kiss to the post and the ball into the net. Who had served him the passage? Of Marco, of course. He, Lautaro, Mkhtaryan are the best. But all well, even Dumfries had never seen it like this. From that moment the party started and Inter played the last minutes as if it were the championship. Even if in disarray Benfica take advantage of it: Neres takes a post, Antonio Silva scores and Musa equalizes in the end. You can dominate a game and finish it to draw three to three. Just don’t play for ten minutes.