Arturo Vidal of FC Internazionale in action during the Serie A match between US Sassuolo and FC Internazionale at Mapei Stadium - Citta del Tricolore on November 28, 2020 in Reggio nell'Emilia, Italy.
Inter put their Champions League struggles behind them in Reggio Emilia on Saturday afternoon as they opened this weekend’s Serie A action with a surprise 3-0 win away to Sassuolo.
As comfortable as the scoreline suggests, the visitors were gifted a two-goal lead early on through a disastrous start from the Neroverdi’s Vlad Chiriches, and from then on the hosts struggled to find their feet in the game, falling to their first defeat of the Serie A season.
Just as they had in this same fixture last season, Inter got off to a flying start through Alexis Sanchez, but Antonio Conte should have really been thanking Chiriches for his side taking the lead.
The Romanian defender failed to defend when facing Lautaro Martinez, and allowed himself to be shrugged to ground easily by the Argentine. Lautaro then squared for Alexis who was composed enough to sit Andrea Consigli down before finishing.
Not even a quarter of an hour had been played before Chiriches struck again. A dangerous ball into the box was set to be gathered by Consigli, though Chiriches ignored his goalkeeper’s calls to needlessly concede a corner, and, from there, his afternoon only worsened.
The resulting corner wasn’t cleared and Vidal fired the second ball back across goal, where it bounced off the 31-year-old and squirmed past Consigli to cross the line.
Filip Djuricic has Sassuolo’s only real effort of the half, clipping the post with a curling effort.
Any hope the Neroverdi had of a comeback were extinguished when Roberto Gagliardini made it three on the hour mark. A quick break from Inter ended with Matteo Darmian teeing up the midfielder who, after setting himself nicely with his first touch, drove a low volley into Consigli’s bottom corner.
Romelu Lukaku came off the bench late on and thought he had added a fourth, only to be thwarted by the offisde flag.
