Inter Milan 6-2 Crotone: Serie A Player Ratings

Let’s take a look at the Serie A Player Ratings from the showdown between Inter Milan and Crotone over at the San Siro.

Inter Milan kicked off the new year in style by beating Crotone in an eight-goal thriller to temporarily move ahead of AC Milan as Serie A leaders.

The Nerazzurri were made to work for this one, though. Crotone pushed them hard and grabbed a surprise 12th-minute lead when Junior Messias played a short corner and then whipped the ball into the box for Niccolo Zanellato to head in. But, with a lovely assist from Romelu Lukaku, Lautaro Martinez equalized just eight minutes later.

6 – #Inter are the first side to score 6+ goals in their first calendar year match in Serie A since Fiorentina against Udinese back in 1959. Fulminant.#InterCrotone pic.twitter.com/RC9sOjVwHF

— OptaPaolo (@OptaPaolo) January 3, 2021

An own goal from Luca Marrone then put the hosts in front just past the half-hour mark. Just as the tide of the match appeared to swing in Inter’s favour, however, Arturo Vidal gave away a penalty.

Vladimir Golemic stepped up and fired the penalty past Samir Handanovic, despite the Inter keeper going the right way.

The scoreline remained the same until the second-half, which saw Inter emerge with all guns blazing.

Antonio Conte’s men scored four goals without reply to seal a fourth successive home league win. Lautaro got the ball rolling by sliding the ball past Alex Cordaz for his second goal following a backheel pass from Marcelo Brozovic. Lukaku then rolled up to slide the ball into the bottom right-hand corner.

1- Lautaro #Martinez has scored his first Serie A hat-trick. For him 1 goal by right foot,1 by left foot and 1 headed. This is the first league perfect hat-trick of an Inter player since Mauro Icardi in March 2017 (vs Atalanta). Author.#InterCrotone

— OptaPaolo (@OptaPaolo) January 3, 2021

But Lautaro wasn’t done there. The Argentine completed his hat-trick for the match ball by heading in the ball into the far corner after Cordaz superbly denied Ivan Perisic.

And, if that wasn’t enough already, a quick counter-attacking move led to Achraf Hakimi bagging a sixth goal late in the game.

Player ratings

Inter Milan: Handanovic (6); Skriniar (6), De Vrij (7),Bastoni (6); Hakimi (8), Barella (6), Brozovic (8), Vidal (6), Young (7); Lukaku (8), Martinez (9).

Bench: Sensi (7), Gagliardini (6), Kolarov (6), Perisic (7).

Crotone: Cordaz (5); Golemic (6), Marrone (4), Luperto (6); Pereira (6), Molina (6), Zanellato (7) Eduardo (6), Reca (6); Messias (7), Riviere (7).

Bench: Nwankwo (6), Djidji (6), Rojas (6), Vulic (6).

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