Inter drop first points in draw at Lazio

MILAN, Oct 4, (AP): Inter Milan dropped their first points of the season as they drew 1-1 at Lazio in Serie A on Sunday, in a match that saw both teams reduced to 10 men late on.

Earlier, Atalanta made it three wins out of three with a 5-2 victory over Cagliari.

In Rome, Lazio were still smarting from a 4-1 defeat at home to Atalanta and were beset by injury problems.

They lost two more players to injury during the first half and also conceded the opener in the 30th minute when Ivan Perisic cut in from the left and managed to get the ball to Lautaro Martínez who turned and fired into bottom left corner.

Martínez has scored in all three of Inter’s matches this season.

However, Inter have been weak at the back in their opening two games, conceding five goals, and their defense let them down again as Sergej Milinković-Savić was able to head home Francesco Acerbi’s cross for the equalizer 10 minutes into the second half.

Lazio forward Ciro Immobile, the league’s top goalscorer was sent off 20 minutes from time for hitting Inter midfielder Arturo Vidal. Although Vidal did appear to go down somewhat dramatically.

Inter midfielder Stefano Sensi was also shown a straight red card, with three minutes remaining, for a similar incident with Lazio defender Patric.

Atalanta offered up another attacking masterclass, taking their tally to 13 goals in three games.

They were the league’s top scoring team last season with 98 goals.

Luis Muriel gave Atalanta the perfect start after just seven minutes and, although Diego Godin equalized on his Cagliari debut, further goals from Alejandro “Papu” Gomez, Mario Pašalić and Duván Zapata put the home side 4-1 up at the break.

João Pedro reduced the deficit early in the second half but Sam

SOCCER

Lammers sealed the match with his first goal for Atalanta with nine minutes remaining.

Parma picked up their first points of the season with a 1-0 win over Hellas Verona.

Benevento beat Bologna by the same scoreline.