Dimarco’s stunner sees Inter win again
Inter Milan made it five wins from its opening five Serie A games with a 1-0 win at Empoli.
Federico Dimarco’s superb strike just after half-time was enough for Simone Inzaghi’s side and while Empoli had chances to equalise, Inter held on to take the points.
The leaders enjoyed the lion’s share of possession in the opening stages and had a couple of half-chances through Matteo Darmian and Davide Frattesi, but Empoli goalkeeper Etrit Berisha dealt with both.
The visitor thought it had opened the scoring when Hakan Çalhanoglu’s short corner was whipped in to Marcus Thuram and he nudged the ball home from close range, only for the linesman to rule it out for offside.
Inter upped the tempo in search of an opener after the break and the first chance fell the way of Dimarco, whose powerful drive was smartly saved by Berisha.
The visitor broke the deadlock in sensational style shortly afterwards. A corner was headed out to Dimarco and his first-time effort from 20 yards flew into the top corner.
Inzaghi’s side went in search of a second to kill the game and almost got one when Thuram found himself with space inside the area but his effort curled marginally wide of the target.
Empoli was looking to avoid a fifth straight loss and an opportunity presented itself from a free-kick just outside the area.
Filippo Ranocchia’s curling effort was on target but goalkeeper Yann Sommer was alert to pull off a superb save having not had much to do previously.
The hosts started to cause last year’s Champions League finalists some issues and almost levelled a couple of minutes later. Stiven Shpendi set up Tommaso Baldanzi but his low drilled strike was blocked well by the Inter defence.
Chances started to fall the way of both sides and Thuram was close to making it two but his curling strike went wide.
Baldanzi was Empoli’s biggest threat and made a darting run off the ball to accomodate Jacopo Fazzini’s pass, but once again the danger was snuffed out by the Inter defence.
Defeat means Empoli became the first team in Serie A history to lose five consecutive games without scoring a goal.
