Inter 2-1 Lazio: Bastoni and Skriniar move champions back to the summit

Alessandro Bastoni scored one goal and set another up for Milan Skriniar as Inter returned to the top of Serie A with a 2-1 win over Lazio.

Bastoni found the back of the net for the first time since June 2020 to put the Nerazzurri in front at San Siro on Sunday, but Ciro Immobile equalised in the first half with his 18th goal of the season.

Inter were not to be denied an eighth consecutive Serie A win, with Bastoni setting up fellow defender Skriniar for the winner midway through the second half.

Victory for Simone Inzaghi’s side against his former club in their first game after the winter break moved them a point above Milan at the summit.

Lautaro Martinez looked to have given Inter a deserved 16th-minute lead when he raced onto a defence-splitting pass from Alexis Sanchez and fired beyond Thomas Strakosha, but the VAR ruled he was marginally offside.

Strakosha produced a great reflex save to keep out Martinez’s rasping volley, but the champions were in front on the half-hour mark when Bastoni bent a brilliant left-foot strike into the bottom-left corner of the net from 25 yards out.

Lazio had not posed much of a threat until the lethal Immobile capitalised on a mix-up between Stefan de Vrij and Skriniar to nip in and level 10 minutes before half-time with a poacher’s finish.

Sergej Milinkovic-Savic spurned a good chance to put Lazio in front when he timed his run into the box to perfection, but failed to make a clean contact on Felipe Anderson’s pinpoint cross.

Luiz Felipe’s crucial block prevented Ivan Perisic from finding the back of the net after Strakosha denied Denzel Dumfries, but the Nerazzurri were back in front midway through the second half.

Bastoni turned provider for Skriniar, whipping in a cross that the centre-back met with a towering header that went in off the crossbar.

There was drama when referee Luca Pairetto showed Stefan Radu a red card before realising that the defender was only guilty of one bookable offence, correcting his mistake by also cautioning Mattia Zaccagni.

15×6 – Ciro Immobile has become tonight the third player able to score at least 15 goals in all the last six seasons in the Big-5 European leagues, after Mohamed Salah and Robert Lewandowski. Élite.#InterLazio pic.twitter.com/AnLrzorVTq

— OptaPaolo  (@OptaPaolo) January 9, 2022