Football: Inter face defensive confidence crisis

MILAN: Inter Milan’s defence will be under scrutiny when they play their first competitive match of the season at the San Siro in the Champions League against Turkish debutants Trabzonspor. Inter’s two competitive games have so far ended in defeat, to arch-rivals AC Milan in the Italian Supercup and in Sicily against Palermo. But it was the manner of their 4-3 reverse to Palermo that was most worrying for coach Gian Piero Gasperini in his first season in the job. Following the defeat, Gasperini blamed lack of concentration. “At the end we had the game in our hands and we could have won but things went against us,” he said. “We have to think about it a lot, we were conceding counters from our own corners due to [a lack of] concentration.”

Published in The Express Tribune, September 14^th, 2011.