Benitez complains of foul not given

Inter Milan coach Rafael Benitez complained that his team had been robbed of victory against Sampdoria claiming that their visitors’ goal at the San Siro should have been chalked off for a foul.

The teams drew 1-1 with Stefano Guberti giving Samp the lead on 62 minutes before Samuel Eto’o came to Inter’s rescue 10 minutes from time.

But it was an incident in the build up to Guberti’s goal that angered Benitez.

Antonio Cassano dispossessed Cristian Chivu in brusque fashion on the flank before crossing for Guberti to volley home.

Even Cassano looked at the linesman following his challenge before playing on.

As Chivu tried to protect the ball, Cassano stuck out a leg to take it away from him, tripping up the Romanian in the process.

It was the type of challenge that would almost always be called a foul in Italy but which in England would probably be considered fair.

And Benitez was not happy.

“I think we had control of the game in the beginning then they had a couple of dangerous counter-attacks but we played well,” he said.

“It was a shame to concede a goal in this way which came from a Cassano foul that wasn’t given.

“As much as Cassano’s reaction in looking at the linesman, you could see it was a foul.

“That mistake conditioned the match. I wasn’t happy with the referee.

“I told the fourth official there were two mistakes but you can’t change the result so we’ll have to improve.

“But if the team keeps creating so many chances, we’ll score a lot.”

That is something Inter have not been doing this season in the league, with just 10 goals in their eight games.

They have also been accused of being over-reliant on Cameroon captain Eto’o, who has bagged seven of those 10.

And while Coutinho, alongside centre-back Lucio, was probably the star of the show, he has yet to open his league account in six outings.

In fact only Diego Milito, who scored twice in the 4-0 thrashing of Bari, has scored in the league amongst Inter’s forward players.

Wesley Sneijder, Goran Pandev and Jonathan Biabiany are also still looking for their first successful strikes.

And with Eto’o’s sizzling form in the centre, it begs the question of what to do with last season’s hero Milito when he comes back from injury — Eto’o has always played wide when Milito has been in the team.

But the Spanish boss brushed aside claims they were too dependent on Eto’o or that he would have a selection headache when Milito returns.

“It’s clear that Eto’o is the centre-forward so it’s clear that he scores,” insisted Benitez.

“Milito is an intelligent player, we’ll find a solution that satisfies them both.

“For us the important thing is to do things well, in good time, and with the team showing character as they did (against Samp).

“I feel things are always improving. We had a great reaction (to going behind) and all that was lacking was a bit of fluidity and luck but we could have won.”