Antonio Conte’s men missed out on winning the Scudeto to Juventus by just a point but they have had a brilliant run in the Europa league and they came up against another very compact team Shakhtar Donetsk in the semifinals of the Europa league on Monday night at the Merkur Spiel-Arena (ESPRIT Arena) in Düsseldorf, Germany. The early exchanges saw Inter on the back foot as Shakhtar Donetsk had the majority of the possessions but it was Inter who got the initiative as they got their noses Infront courtesy of a perfectly timed header by Lautaro Martinez who headed home from a cross from Nicolo Barella, his 20th goal of the season, and it was 1-nil in the 19th minute.
Inter are unbeaten in their last 10 games while Shakhtar on the other hand have lost just once in 15 games in all competitions and despite been one goal down, Luis Castro’s men continued in control from there as they kept the pressure up but they could not manage to test Samir Handanovic in goal for Inter and it stayed that way as the Italian side took the lone goal advantage into the period of half time.
2nd 45 started pretty much like how the 1st started with Shakhtar still very much in control of possession, but they lack quality in thier final balls as Inter gradually grew into the game as well with the goal scorer Lautaro Martinez getting the chance to test the goal keeper in the 49th minutes when he directed a shot on goal but was comfortably saved by the Shakhtar keeper, Inter would get their second of the night through – Danilo D’Ambrosio who got another headed goal, this time from Marcelo Brozovic’s cross to make it 2-0 for “Nerazzurris”.
Maritinez completed his brace on the 74th minutes has he got a 3rd on the night through a very quick counter attacking move which saw Romelo Lukaku lay on an assist to him to put the game beyond Shakhtar. Former Chelsea and Manchester United forward Lukaku who has had a goal laden season so far so good got in the goals as well as he got two quick goals in 5minutes. The 1st in the 78th minute when Yevheniy Konoplyanka who only just came on as a sub some 3 minutes earlier made a defensive blunder and gave the ball away for Martinez to set Lukaku up for the 4th goal and the his brace was completed in the 83rd minutes when he drove forward with power and confidence and as he slot the ball into Shakhtar’s net giving Andriy Pyatov no chance at all, his goal number 33 of the season and a man of the match performance. He has now scored in 10 consecutive Europa league matches, the 1st player to have done so in the competition.
Inter with a sweet victory to set up a final match up against 5-time champions of the competition Sevilla RheinEnergieStadion in Cologne on Friday 21st August.
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