AC Milan were once again left licking their wounds at the hands of their city rivals Inter as they were beaten 5-1 in the Derby della Madonnina on Saturday evening.
Both teams had won all three games in Serie A thus far heading into the game at San Siro, but goals from Henrikh Mkhitaryan and Marcus Thuram before the break made it clear Inter were in the mood to continue their recent derby dominance.
Rafael Leao’s well-taken finish did halve the deficit and suggest it would be a close finish, but Mkhitaryan’s second and a Hakan Calhanoglu penalty pulled the Nerazzurri away again in the torrential rain. Davide Frattesi added some gloss to the scoreline in added time.
The result means that Milan are now below Simone Inzaghi’s side but also Juventus who won against Lazio, while waiting for the other games to happen this round.
Stefano Pioli made one change to the line-up that started the first three games of the season and it was a forced one with Fikayo Tomori suspended. Simon Kjaer came in to partner Malick Thiaw, with Pierre Kalulu out injured.
It took less than five minutes for the first controversial moment to occur, and it ended with Inter putting the ball in the back of the net. There was contact between Dumfries and Theo and then between Thuram and Thiaw before the French striker fired in a low cross.
The ball was recycled and eventually Mkhitaryan turned it in first time from close range, and the goal stood despite the incessant protests from Milan players, and a length check too.
Mkhitaryan should have had his and Inter’s second five minutes after he opened the scoring, with Dimarco whipping in an inch-perfect ball that the Armenian met with a glancing header that went wide of the far post.
Midway through the first half Milan began to build a bit of pressure with some passing moves inside Inter’s half, but it was a clipped ball over the top from Theo towards Leao that caused panic. The winger had got goal side of Dumfries, and though his first touch took it down Sommer was able to collect before he had time to readjust.
The questionable officiating from Souza continued when Thiaw chased Thuram towards the byline and slid in, though the referee whistled for a foul and gave a yellow card despite the fact replays showed he got a touch on the ball.
Milan thought they had almost carved Inter open with an excellent free-kick routine that saw Theo slide in Leao, though Sommer saved his attempt and the offside flag rightly went up.
The dancing feet of Theo Hernandez almost brought the Rossoneri level on the half-hour mark as he weaved between two defenders and skewed a shot just wide of the far post from deep inside the box, and Darmian could perhaps consider himself lucky that the full-back didn’t go down.
Just as Pioli’s men had got well on top and were knocking on the door, they were sucker-punched at the other end. A counter-attack saw Dumfries play a ball into the path of Thuram down the left side and though he was initially held up, he got one-on-one with Thiaw and fired a stunning shot into the far top corner.
Right on the stroke of half-time Milan had a golden chance that they needed to take when Giroud won a free-kick just outside the edge of the box, yet he dusted himself off and whipped the shot well over the bar.
The pattern in the early stages of the second half followed the latter part of the first half, with Milan allowed to harbour the majority of possession but without much penetration and plenty of threat on the counter.
The only attempt before 55 minutes from a Milan player was Reijnders, who wound up a shot from 25 yards out but sent it flying over the bar as the rain lashed down.
However, in the 57th minute the Rossoneri did get themselves back in the game and it came through a beautiful link-up between Leao and Giroud. The striker held the ball up and with his back to goal sent the Portuguese winger through on goal with an inch-perfect pass, which he converted one-on-one with Sommer.
Just as it looked like being a grandstand finish to the game, Inter re-established their two-goal lead with just over 20 minutes left on the clock. Again Milan’s defence in transition let them down as Lautaro was allowed to square to Mkhitaryan, who took a couple of touches and fired past Maignan’s near post via a deflection.
With just under 15 minutes left, Pioli made some changes. Alessandro Florenzi, Luka Jovic and Noah Okafor came on, with Calabria, Giroud and Reijnders coming off.
A few minutes later, they made it 4-1 from the penalty spot. A silly attempt from Theo to get to a loose ball inside the box ended with Lautaro going down after being kicked on the boot, and the penalty was emphatically despatched.
The final change came with not long on the clock left as Yunus Musah came on for Loftus-Cheek, but by this point it was a training exercise to play out the final few minutes.
Things got even worse in the third minute of added time as the unmarked run of substitute Frattesi was picked out by an excellent through-ball by Mkhitaryan, and he had the simple job of finishing one-on-one past Maignan.
