Internazionale’s captain, Mauro Icardi, scored a perfect hat-trick in 10 first-half minutes and Ever Banega also helped himself to three goals in a 7-1 rout of hapless Atalanta in Serie A on Sunday.
Atalanta, whose coach Gian Piero Gasperini was infamously sacked by Inter after only five games in 2011, started the day above Inter and had been expected to provide a stern test to their opponents.
Instead Icardi’s quickfire hat-trick followed by two goals by his fellow Argentinian put Inter 5-0 ahead after 35 minutes to put a dampener on what has so far been an excellent season for Atalanta. Banega completed his treble after Remo Freuler pulled the ball back while the other Inter goal was scored by Roberto Gagliardini, who left Atalanta in January. The win took Inter above their opponents into fourth place. Lazio, currently in fifth, host Torino on Monday.
Napoli, who started the weekend in third place, were awarded two penalties on the way to a 3-0 win over lowly Crotone as they bounced back from their Champions League elimination by Real Madrid.
Lorenzo Insigne converted the first after 32 minutes and Dries Mertens the second, an extremely harsh decision for the faintest of touches on Marek Hamsik, in the 66th. Insigne then completed the scoring.
In Sunday’s late kick-off Roma cut the gap on the leaders, Juventus, back to eight points with a 3-0 win at relegation-threatened Palermo. Stephan El Shaarawy opened the scoring in the 22nd minute, turning in Clement Grenier’s pinpoint cross before the substitute Edin Dzeko scored his 20th goal of the season from a narrow angle.
Palermo, who remain seven points from safety, saw Ilija Nestorovski’s early strike ruled out for offside, sparing the blushes of the Roma goalkeeper, Wojciech Szczesny, who had spilled the Macedonia striker’s cross-shot into the net. The Silician strugglers’ misery was compounded when Bruno Peres added a third in stoppage time.
Elsewhere Nikola Kalinic scored in stoppage time to give Fiorentina a 1-0 win over Cagliari while Chievo thumped Empoli 4-0 with Roberto Inglese, Sergio Pellissier, Valter Birsa and Bostjan Cesar on target. Udinese won 3-1 at rock-bottom Pescara, while Bologna won 1-0 at Sassuolo thanks to a second-half goal from Mattia Destro.
The league leaders, Juventus, beat Milan 2-1 on Friday night thanks to a controversial late penalty, converted by Pablo Dybala, while on Saturday a Luis Muriel goal was enough for Sampdoria to win their derby clash with Genoa 1-0.