Antonio Conte believes Inter's hard work is paying off as they target a first Serie A title since the 2009-10 season.
The Nerazzurri sealed a fifth consecutive top-flight win on Sunday, with goals from Romelu Lukaku, Matteo Darmian and Alexis Sanchez securing a 3-0 victory over Genoa at San Siro.
It was Inter's sixth straight top-flight win against Genoa without conceding a single goal – the first time they have achieved this against any opponent in the competition.
The result moved them seven points clear of Milan at the Serie A summit, although Stefano Pioli's side had the chance to rein them in with victory over Roma later on Sunday.
Conte was pleased with his side's display and said his players deserve recognition for being this season's standard-bearers ahead of Juventus, who have won the last nine titles.
"We played against a Genoa side in great shape," Conte told Sky Sport Italia.
"We had the right approach, allowing Genoa little other than a few crosses. We scored three goals, [Genoa goalkeeper] Mattia Perin had to make several big saves, so we are happy.
"All the work is paying off. It had already started to last year, but the team is developing belief in its capabilities, understanding the situations both on and off the ball, when to be aggressive, when to hold possession.
"These are Inter players, they must always have the ambition to win. It has been many years since Inter won anything, we came very close last season [they finished one point behind Juve], despite the fact it was my first year.
"In previous years, the gap with Juventus was a good 15 points for Inter. So, if we want to be objective and calculate the gap from the leaders and Inter before I arrived, last season was already an enormous step forward.
"I think we simply continued the project and we are doing something important, but there are 14 games to go.
"We have to continue like this, knowing the team have grown in every way, that we created wonderful synergy and empathy between everyone here, but winning is the aim."
Inter endured a disappointing Champions League campaign earlier this term, finishing bottom of Group B having won just one of their six games.
Conte believes that disappointment could well have provided the impetus for their Serie A title challenge, acknowledging it forced them to raise their game.
"I think we went out of the Champions League undeservedly, but that made us look inside ourselves and realise we all had to raise the bar, to be more competitive," he added.
"If we had been in the Champions League right now, I think we could've had our say in that tournament."
Inter travel to Parma in Serie A on Thursday before hosting Atalanta four days later.
Reggae Boyz Magee, Williams help Colorado Springs Switchbacks FC mark 10th anniversary in USL Championship with maiden title
Colorado Springs Switchbacks FC, home of Reggae Boyz Tyreek Magee and Devon “Speedy” Williams, earned their first USL Championship league title with a 3-0 victory against Rhode Island FC in the final before a sellout crowd of 8,023 fans at Weidner Field on Saturday.
Williams played all 90 minutes while Magee came on as a second half substitute.
The Switchbacks opened the scoring in the 22nd minute through Juan Tejada, who claimed Championship Final MVP.
Three minutes before the halftime interval, sustained pressure from Colorado Springs was rewarded when Jairo Henriquez doubled their advantage.
In the 53rd minute the Switchbacks had their third through Haitian international Ronaldo Damus.
The victory capped the Switchbacks’ 10th anniversary season and maintained their perfect postseason record at home since the opening of Weidner Field in 2021.
As for Magee and Williams’ individual stats throughout the season, Magee scored three goals and provided one assist in 18 appearances while Williams recorded five assists in 36 appearances.
This win also makes Williams now a four-time USL Champion having won with New York Red Bulls II in 2015-16 as well as back to back titles with Louisville City FC in 2016-17 and 2017-18.
The 32-year-old Williams has been capped 35 times by the Reggae Boyz, most recently in a friendly against Guatemala last December while Magee, 25, has earned 13 caps for the Reggae Boyz, most recently against the USA in the Concacaf Nations League Quarterfinals last week.
De Bruyne describes 'chaotic' Man City scenes
Kevin De Bruyne conceded there has been some chaos behind the scenes at Manchester City, but refuted the suggestion there is a dark atmosphere.
City have lost their last five games in all competitions, while they are eight points back from leaders Liverpool in the Premier League.
Their dismal run of form continued with a shock 4-0 loss at home to Tottenham on Saturday.
De Bruyne, who has featured just six times in the Premier League this season and made just four starts, says there is not a bad mood in the camp, though.
"I wouldn't say dark, it's been a bit chaotic," said the Belgian ahead of Tuesday's Champions League clash with Feyenoord.
"I've seen so many people pass around the medical area, sport science, whose playing and not playing. There's been so many people playing who shouldn't have been playing.
"The games against Sporting, Brighton and Bournemouth were all over the place. Tottenham was more normal.
"I didn't see too much change, everyone is down about the five losses. You have to move on."
City have already shipped 17 league goals this term, while they were beaten 4-1 by Sporting CP in their last European outing.
Since their losing run started with a 2-1 loss to Spurs in the EFL Cup on October 30, City have conceded 14 goals from 10.6 expected goals against (xGA).
"There's only so much you can control from the sides. It's not a nice feeling but it's fine," De Bryne added.
"It seems like we're not really dealing with the moments when it goes bad. There's moments like the Tottenham game which we do really well. The main issue is both boxes. We're conceding too many goals. I don't think we played a bad game the other day but we lost 4-0."
"If you give five chances against Tottenham, that's not that bad. They get two tap-ins. With the way we play, you have to accept there's more opportunity for teams to have a counter. At the moment, we're not dealing with this in a good way.
"We're always going to give a chance away. We're giving it away too many times. When we give a chance at goal, it's basically a goal."
De Bruyne is out of contract at the end of the season, though the 33-year-old is not overly concerned about his future.
"I honestly don't know. At the start of the season, I knew talks would happen but then the thing [injury] happened in Brentford. It was meant to be a couple of days and then it was eight, nine weeks. I put it all to the side," he added.
"I'm not too worried. I'm fine. I'm happy, I just want to play good football again and the future, we'll see.
"I only can really give you the answers, but I don't know. If there's no talks it will be my last year at the club, but I don't know.
"I had a conversation in the summer, but then I had the injury so I wasn't in the right frame of mind to talk about that. I need to be back on the pitch and be myself again. There's no rush, I don't feel uncomfortable, I'm not worried."
Real Madrid dealt Vinicius injury blow before Champions League clash at Liverpool
Vinicius Junior is set to miss his side's Champions League clash at Liverpool after sustaining a leg muscle injury, Real Madrid announced.
Reports suggest that Vinicius could be sidelined for at least three weeks, which means he could miss up to seven games in all competitions before the winter break, including against Girona and Athletic Bilbao in LaLiga and a Champions League visit to Atalanta.
The Brazilian played all 90 minutes against Leganes on Sunday, setting up Kylian Mbappe's opener in Madrid's 3-0 win.
In the Champions League, he is the second-highest scorer, having netted four times in four matches, while only Rico Lewis (13) has created more chances than him (12).
"Following tests carried out today on our player Vini Jr by the Real Madrid Medical Services, he has been diagnosed with an injury to the biceps femoris in his left leg. Pending evolution," Madrid said in a statement.
Vinicius is the latest to join the club's lengthy injury list, which includes key players like Rodrygo, Eder Militao, Dani Carvajal, Lucas Vazquez, Aurelien Tchouameni and David Alaba.
Madrid are second in the LaLiga standings on 30 points. However, after two losses in their last three games in the Champions League, Carlo Ancelotti's side could be in trouble with a bad result at Anfield. They are 18th in the 36-team table with six points from four games.
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