Inter Milan rolled back the years to stretch their lead at the top of Serie A on Wednesday on a night of upsets that saw champions Juventus held by Frosinone and AS Roma lose to Sampdoria.
Inter's blistering start to the season has left many commentators believing they have already stolen a march on four-time successive champions Juventus in the fight for this season's scudetto.
Only five matches into the campaign, those predictions look to be ringing true.
Brazilian Felipe Melo rose to head the game’s only goal 11 minutes after the restart as Inter held on to beat Verona claim their fifth consecutive win – the first time the team have achieved such a feat since the start of the 1966/67 season.
Inter owner and president Erick Thohir was at the San Siro and said: “I’m delighted ... winning our opening five games is incredible, but we have many other matches to win so we’ll go one step at a time.”
His thoughts were echoed by coach Roberto Mancini, who when asked about their status as title favourites quipped: “Maybe we are, until our next league match.”
Inter are away to high-flying Fiorentina this weekend, and Mancini added: "The first games of the season are all difficult, you can see that by the fact other teams that should be fighting for the title are struggling.
“Teams get better as each game passes. It’s one step at a time.”
Mancini’s men sit top with a three-point lead on Fiorentina, who saw Jakub Blaszczykowski and Nikola Kalinic score one apiece in 11, late second-half minutes to secure a 2-0 home win over outclassed Bologna.
Sassuolo are only a point further adrift in third, thanks to the club’s shock 1-0 win at Palermo, courtesy of Sergio Floccari’s stunning first-half effort for the visitors.
At the Stadio Olimpico, Lazio made amends for their 5-0 humiliation at Napoli on Sunday with a deserved 2-0 win over Genoa that saw Filip Djordjevic, with a diving header and Brazilian Felipe Anderson, with a superb, curling effort, wrap up the points for Stefano Pioli's men.
Juventus coach Massimiliano Allegri rested a number of regulars, including goalkeeper Gianluigi Buffon for the visit of Frosinone.
But the Italian’s tactics ultimately backfired after Leonardo Blanchard headed home from a corner in injury time to level Simone Zaza’s strike minutes after the restart.
It gave the new boys their first point of the season, and coach Roberto Stellone was particularly happy: “For an ex-Torino player, it’s a particularly pleasing result.”
Juventus had claimed only one point from their opening three games, their worst start to the campaign in several decades, before ending their drought at Genoa on Sunday.
This latest setback has left last season’s beaten Champions League finalists in 10th place, eight points adrift of Inter.
Allegri hit out: “We can’t be conceding corners to a team like Frosinone at this stage of the game.
“We just didn’t manage this game well and paid the price for naive errors. We should have put the game beyond doubt well before then.”
Title rivals Roma are faring slightly better, but coach Rudi Garcia was left ruing a massive defensive blunder as they looked to be heading for a well-deserved point at the Stadio Luigi Ferraris.
Roma bossed the opening half and Sampdoria broke the deadlock against the run of play four minutes after the restart when Eder stepped up to fire a free kick just inside Morgan De Sanctis’s near post.
Roma pulled level halfway through the second period when Mohamed Salah, unmarked inside the area, fired Miralem Pjanic’s slide-rule pass into the roof of the net.
Five minutes from time Kostas Manolas’s attempt to clear Eder’s drive across goal was comical, the ball splicing into the net.
Roma's first defeat of the campaign left them in ninth place, seven points behind Inter and one behind AC Milan, who edged Udinese 3-2 on Tuesday.
Follow us on Twitter @NatSportUAE
In-demand jobs and monthly salaries
- Technology expert in robotics and automation: Dh20,000 to Dh40,000
- Energy engineer: Dh25,000 to Dh30,000
- Production engineer: Dh30,000 to Dh40,000
- Data-driven supply chain management professional: Dh30,000 to Dh50,000
- HR leader: Dh40,000 to Dh60,000
- Engineering leader: Dh30,000 to Dh55,000
- Project manager: Dh55,000 to Dh65,000
- Senior reservoir engineer: Dh40,000 to Dh55,000
- Senior drilling engineer: Dh38,000 to Dh46,000
- Senior process engineer: Dh28,000 to Dh38,000
- Senior maintenance engineer: Dh22,000 to Dh34,000
- Field engineer: Dh6,500 to Dh7,500
- Field supervisor: Dh9,000 to Dh12,000
- Field operator: Dh5,000 to Dh7,000
Ultra processed foods
- Carbonated drinks, sweet or savoury packaged snacks, confectionery, mass-produced packaged breads and buns
- margarines and spreads; cookies, biscuits, pastries, cakes, and cake mixes, breakfast cereals, cereal and energy bars;
- energy drinks, milk drinks, fruit yoghurts and fruit drinks, cocoa drinks, meat and chicken extracts and instant sauces
- infant formulas and follow-on milks, health and slimming products such as powdered or fortified meal and dish substitutes,
- many ready-to-heat products including pre-prepared pies and pasta and pizza dishes, poultry and fish nuggets and sticks, sausages, burgers, hot dogs, and other reconstituted meat products, powdered and packaged instant soups, noodles and desserts.
SHAITTAN
%3Cp%3E%3Cstrong%3EDirector%3A%20%3C%2Fstrong%3EVikas%20Bahl%3Cbr%3E%3Cstrong%3EStarring%3A%20%3C%2Fstrong%3EAjay%20Devgn%2C%20R.%20Madhavan%2C%20Jyothika%2C%20Janaki%20Bodiwala%3Cbr%3E%3Cstrong%3ERating%3A%20%3C%2Fstrong%3E3%2F5%3C%2Fp%3E%0A
Desert Warrior
Starring: Anthony Mackie, Aiysha Hart, Ben Kingsley
Director: Rupert Wyatt
Rating: 3/5
Key changes
Commission caps
For life insurance products with a savings component, Peter Hodgins of Clyde & Co said different caps apply to the saving and protection elements:
• For the saving component, a cap of 4.5 per cent of the annualised premium per year (which may not exceed 90 per cent of the annualised premium over the policy term).
• On the protection component, there is a cap of 10 per cent of the annualised premium per year (which may not exceed 160 per cent of the annualised premium over the policy term).
• Indemnity commission, the amount of commission that can be advanced to a product salesperson, can be 50 per cent of the annualised premium for the first year or 50 per cent of the total commissions on the policy calculated.
• The remaining commission after deduction of the indemnity commission is paid equally over the premium payment term.
• For pure protection products, which only offer a life insurance component, the maximum commission will be 10 per cent of the annualised premium multiplied by the length of the policy in years.
Disclosure
Customers must now be provided with a full illustration of the product they are buying to ensure they understand the potential returns on savings products as well as the effects of any charges. There is also a “free-look” period of 30 days, where insurers must provide a full refund if the buyer wishes to cancel the policy.
“The illustration should provide for at least two scenarios to illustrate the performance of the product,” said Mr Hodgins. “All illustrations are required to be signed by the customer.”
Another illustration must outline surrender charges to ensure they understand the costs of exiting a fixed-term product early.
Illustrations must also be kept updatedand insurers must provide information on the top five investment funds available annually, including at least five years' performance data.
“This may be segregated based on the risk appetite of the customer (in which case, the top five funds for each segment must be provided),” said Mr Hodgins.
Product providers must also disclose the ratio of protection benefit to savings benefits. If a protection benefit ratio is less than 10 per cent "the product must carry a warning stating that it has limited or no protection benefit" Mr Hodgins added.
RESULTS
Bantamweight title:
Vinicius de Oliveira (BRA) bt Xavier Alaoui (MAR)
(KO round 2)
Catchweight 68kg:
Sean Soriano (USA) bt Noad Lahat (ISR)
(TKO round 1)
Middleweight:
Denis Tiuliulin (RUS) bt Juscelino Ferreira (BRA)
(TKO round 1)
Lightweight:
Anas Siraj Mounir (MAR) bt Joachim Tollefsen (DEN)
(Unanimous decision)
Catchweight 68kg:
Austin Arnett (USA) bt Daniel Vega (MEX)
(TKO round 3)
Lightweight:
Carrington Banks (USA) bt Marcio Andrade (BRA)
(Unanimous decision)
Catchweight 58kg:
Corinne Laframboise (CAN) bt Malin Hermansson (SWE)
(Submission round 2)
Bantamweight:
Jalal Al Daaja (CAN) bt Juares Dea (CMR)
(Split decision)
Middleweight:
Mohamad Osseili (LEB) bt Ivan Slynko (UKR)
(TKO round 1)
Featherweight:
Tarun Grigoryan (ARM) bt Islam Makhamadjanov (UZB)
(Unanimous decision)
Catchweight 54kg:
Mariagiovanna Vai (ITA) bt Daniella Shutov (ISR)
(Submission round 1)
Middleweight:
Joan Arastey (ESP) bt Omran Chaaban (LEB)
(Unanimous decision)
Welterweight:
Bruno Carvalho (POR) bt Souhil Tahiri (ALG)
(TKO)
Cinco in numbers
Dh3.7 million
The estimated cost of Victoria Swarovski’s gem-encrusted Michael Cinco wedding gown
46
The number, in kilograms, that Swarovski’s wedding gown weighed.
1,000
The hours it took to create Cinco’s vermillion petal gown, as seen in his atelier [note, is the one he’s playing with in the corner of a room]
50
How many looks Cinco has created in a new collection to celebrate Ballet Philippines’ 50th birthday
3,000
The hours needed to create the butterfly gown worn by Aishwarya Rai to the 2018 Cannes Film Festival.
1.1 million
The number of followers that Michael Cinco’s Instagram account has garnered.
'The worst thing you can eat'
Trans fat is typically found in fried and baked goods, but you may be consuming more than you think.
Powdered coffee creamer, microwave popcorn and virtually anything processed with a crust is likely to contain it, as this guide from Mayo Clinic outlines:
Baked goods - Most cakes, cookies, pie crusts and crackers contain shortening, which is usually made from partially hydrogenated vegetable oil. Ready-made frosting is another source of trans fat.
Snacks - Potato, corn and tortilla chips often contain trans fat. And while popcorn can be a healthy snack, many types of packaged or microwave popcorn use trans fat to help cook or flavour the popcorn.
Fried food - Foods that require deep frying — french fries, doughnuts and fried chicken — can contain trans fat from the oil used in the cooking process.
Refrigerator dough - Products such as canned biscuits and cinnamon rolls often contain trans fat, as do frozen pizza crusts.
Creamer and margarine - Nondairy coffee creamer and stick margarines also may contain partially hydrogenated vegetable oils.
Turkish Ladies
Various artists, Sony Music Turkey
