ROME- INTER Milan increased their lead at the top of Serie A to 10 points after they crushed Cagliari 3-0 at the San Siro while second placed AC Milan were held to a 0-0 draw at Bologna.
Ahead of the Milan derby two weeks ago the Serie A title race seemed to be alive and kicking with Milan knowing a victory would have left them three points behind and with a game in hand.
But they lost that and have drawn their next two leaving the champions to creep over the hill and out of sight. Goals from Goran Pandev, Walter Samuel and Diego Milito earned Jose Mourinho's men the three points that give them a seemingly unassailable lead.
It left Mourinho reflecting on a profitable month. 'It's an important victory because it puts us 10 points clear of second place,' he said. 'We developed a lot of confidence in January and today we began with a confident and attacking mentality. Cagliari aren't an easy team to play and even when 2-0 down they didn't let up and created some problems. But we were solid and compact and Pandev had a great game.'
There was an ominous feel to the game when Inter took the lead after just six minutes. Captain Javier Zanetti made a typically purposeful burst down the right flank, breaking into the box and pulling the ball back for Samuel Eto'o, playing his first game since returning from African Nations Cup duty, but the Cameroon hitman's poor shot hit two defenders before falling invitingly into Pandev's path, the Macedonian slotting home at the near post.
On 20 minutes it seemed to be game, set and match as centre-back Samuel rose in the box to head home a Maicon corner for 2-0. And yet Cagliari could, and possibly should, have gone into the break level. Alessandro Matri had a goal wrongly disallowed on 34 minutes when, although he was marginally offside as the ball was played through to him, television replays showed that it was Inter full-back Davide Santon's touch which sent him in on Julio Cesar. -- AFP
