Icardi’s 4 leads Inter Milan to 5-0 win at Sampdoria

From the play Sunday against Sampdoria, Mauro Icardi is back, Ivan Perisic is back and, most importantly, Inter Milan is back.

Icardi scored his first goal since Jan. 5 and closed his account with four goals as the Nerazzurri defeated Sampdoria 5-0 at the Stadio Luigi Ferraris.

The win put Inter two points clear of Lazio in fourth place in Serie A and just a point back of Roma. It was also Inter’s first win away from the San Siro since November.

It was Icardi’s second hat trick of the season and came in the span of 14 minutes in the first half. The first coming after Barcelona transfer Rafinha earned a penalty coming down in the box between Edgar Barreto and Lucas Torreira. That was the 100^th Serie A goal for the Argentinian.

Just minutes later, Ivan Perisic pulled the ball back from the touch line on the right. The effort was deflected to Icardi’s feet. Icardi promptly back-heeled the effort past Emiliano Viviano.

Rafinha nearly got his first goal as a Nerazzurri when Antonio Candreva crossed to the midfielder in the 44^th minute. Rafinha attempted a back-heel of his own, but Viviano was there to push it aside. Unfortunately for Viviano, Icardi, who played two seasons at Sampdoria, was there to clean up the brush-off for his third goal of the game, giving Inter a 4-0 lead at halftime.

Not to be overlooked was the fact that it was Perisic that put Inter on the board first in the 26^th minute — scoring his first since a hat trick against Chievo Verona back in December.

In the second half, Icardi picked up his fourth of the game with a shot coming off a high volley in the penalty area. Icardi drilled the ball past Viviano on the bounce to put the Nerazzurri up 5-0 in the 51^st minute.

Inter Milan will have the next weekend off for the international break. Joao Cancelo is set to play for Portugal while Ivan Perisic and Marcelo Brozovic earned call-ups to the Croatian national team for their friendlies against Peru and Mexico — both played in the United States. Roberto Gagliardini and Antonio Candreva were both called up by Italian national team interim manager Luigi Di Biagio for games against England and Argentina.

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