Although Ricardo decided to break the deadlock with a long-range shot, he was not in a hurry to shoot. Regardless of whether there is a chance or not, if you catch the ball and shoot, that is called wave shooting.

Although Ricardo is now the de facto offensive heart of the team, his status is not high enough to shoot at will.

Therefore, he is still steady, according to Mancini's tactical deployment, take the ball on the left side and cross or cut inside, and after cutting inside, he chooses to pass or shoot according to the situation, and the number of passes is more. Because Juventus' two centre-backs are so strong in front of the defense, he rarely has the opportunity to shoot immediately after cutting inside.

Now he's waiting for an opportunity to arise. As before, Adriano switched positions with him, running to the left to get the ball and he ran to the middle. When Adriano draws Cannavaro and Thuram away and passes the ball to him, he looks for another chance to shoot from distance.

In the 40th minute, Inter Milan had a chance to score. Chiellini made a flying tackle on Ricardo and referee Paparesta awarded Chiellini a foul, gave Chiellini a yellow card, and then gave him an indirect free-kick.

However, none of the Inter players noticed this.

As the ball was relatively close to goal, it was Ricardo who took the penalty, and this time he played a brilliant lift ball that plunged over the wall and flew into the net, while Buffon remained motionless.

When Ricardo was about to run to the sidelines to celebrate with tai chi, he looked back to see that Paparesta had declared the goal nullified and that the Inter players were surrounding him for an explanation.

Ricardo was immediately furious, the penalty at the beginning of the game was not awarded, and now his goal was blown away. He rushed up to Paparesta and shouted, "Why is the goal invalid!" ”

Paparesta gave him a cold look and said, "It's an indirect free kick. ”

Ricardo was speechless. He hadn't really noticed Paparesta's gesture before.

If his free-kick touches a defender or deflects off his own before scoring a goal, the goal will be valid.

"Why an indirect free-kick?" Ricardo was not convinced.

"Because I was sentenced for Chiellini's dangerous moves." Paparesta explained.

Ricardo could only be speechless and ran away.

Although this little episode affected his mood a little, he quickly put aside distractions and threw himself into the game.

In the 45th minute, Juventus' attack was blocked by Inter Milan defenders, Pizarro found Ricardo with a long pass, and Inter Milan had a chance to counterattack.

Ricardo ran wildly along the left side for more than 20 meters, shoved the ball forward, Adriano stabbed in diagonally, received the ball and continued to dribble on the left side.

Ricardo perked up and quickly ran to the middle.

Seeing Adriano use his strong body to protect the ball, attracting both Thuram and Barzaretti, Cannavaro saw this and posted it to Ricardo.

Before Cannavaro could get in place, Adriano's pass had already arrived. Due to the two-man trap, his passing accuracy was affected a little, and he flew far in front of Ricardo.

Ricardo could only speed up and finally narrowly stopped the ball, but due to irregular movements, the stop was a bit too big, and he immediately pulled the ball back to avoid Cannavaro's steal.

At this time, his Brazilian national teammate Emerson also came back to defend and tried to pull the ball from behind, Figo shouted from the side: "Watch the back!" ”

Ricardo leaned back, shielded the ball with his body, and then kicked the ball with his left foot, as if to pass it to Figo.

But he kicked out the ball at the last minute and pulled the ball back, flicked it to the left, shook off Cannavaro, and followed up with a left-footed shot.

The kick was so unexpected, Buffon's reaction was half a beat slower, and by the time he realised it, the football was close at hand.

He barely made a save, but only touched the ball with his fingertips and deflected it slightly away. However, football is still stubborn and has sunk headlong into the net.

"Ricardo Goal! It was a long-range shot from 25 meters away, Buffon couldn't make a save, and Inter Milan led 1:0! The first half was coming to an end and Inter Milan finally took the lead! ”

Ricardo moved like a cloud of peers, calmly bouncing through the traps of Cannavaro and Emerson, and finally swooping out a cold arrow to break Buffon's ten-finger barrier. He's celebrating again with that Chinese kung fu set, his 14th league goal of the season, and he's obviously excited! With this goal efficiency, he will be the strongest contender for the Serie A Golden Boot this season! ”

"Throughout the first half, Inter's standout player was Ricardo, who caused problems for the Juventus defence on several occasions. And, of course, Figo, who often switches positions with Ricardo, and while he doesn't have as much explosiveness and speed as Ricardo, he makes Chiellini and Barzaretti suffer with his nimble movement and excellent technique. ”

After the game restarted and Juventus played a wave of attacks, Paparesta blew the whistle to announce the end of the first half.

Players from both sides walked into the locker room with different looks.

"Very good," Mancini looked satisfied, his approving gaze swept over the players' faces, "but don't be complacent, a 1-0 lead is the least safe score in the world, and we need to work on the defensive side and try to extend the advantage through counter-attacks." ”

"I hope you put aside all distractions, don't think about the changes in the standings, don't think about the championship, don't think about the next Champions League, we have only one goal now: to beat Juventus and get all three points! I'm sure you can do it! Mancini encouraged, "Every one of you was great in the first half, but I want to see you better!" ”

Next, he meticulously laid out the tactics for the second half. In general, there are no changes, only some minor tweaks in the details.

For example, Adriano and Ricardo scored in the same way that Mancini demanded they continued to play in the second half.

For example, McCone was asked to provide fewer assists and return to the middle more, using his height advantage to help the two centre-backs defend the opposition's two high school forwards.

For example, Cambiasso was asked to move forward a little more, while Pizarro was pushed back a little more, allowing Pizarro to play a "metronome" role similar to Pirlo's at AC Milan.

In the Juventus dressing room, Capello did not criticize the players too much, but only vaguely expressed his dissatisfaction with Cannavaro and Emerson, believing that they gave Licardo too much room to move.

He also made some tactical tweaks to Inter's style of play.

'Equalise as soon as possible and get the game back to the rhythm we are familiar with. We can win! Capello concluded.