Ten-man Inter finally claimed their first Champions League points of the season on Wednesday night, Carlos Augusto's 77th-minute goal beating Shakhtar Donetsk 1-0 at San Siro. Alessandro Bastoni's red card for two yellows had left Cristian Chivu's side a man down for the final quarter — but substitute Henrikh Mkhitaryan created the winner minutes later and Inter held on for a victory their campaign desperately needed.
A goalless grind, then Bastoni walks
Inter arrived pointless and under pressure — beaten in both opening games, including the 4-3 defeat by Club Brugge — and it showed in a tense first half. Marcus Thuram and Ange-Yoan Bonny both forced Dmytro Riznyk into saves, Hakan Calhanoglu fired four efforts off target or blocked, and Shakhtar, organised by Arda Turan, carried a threat through Kaua Elias and Alisson. Pedrinho's injury on the half-hour, replaced by Yehor Nazaryna, was the half's only major incident.
Chivu rolled the dice on 59 minutes with a triple change, but on 68 minutes the night seemed to turn against him for good: Bastoni collected a second yellow card in quick succession and was sent off, leaving Inter to defend a goalless draw — or worse — with ten men, as OneFootball's live coverage recorded. San Siro braced for another European collapse.
Mkhitaryan and Carlos Augusto stun Shakhtar
Instead, Inter produced the goal of their season. Mkhitaryan, sent on for Bonny on 75 minutes, dropped a sumptuous ball over the top two minutes later and Carlos Augusto slid home the finish for 1-0 — a defender scoring the winner for a ten-man team that had not managed a single point in this competition.
The numbers underlined how little separated the sides: possession split exactly 50-50, shots 14 to ten in Inter's favour, four saves apiece for the goalkeepers. What Inter had, and Shakhtar did not, was a bench that changed the game — Bisseck stiffened the defence after the red card, Luis Henrique stretched tired legs, and Mkhitaryan, at 37, provided the single moment of true class on a night of perspiration. For Chivu, under pressure after two defeats and with the San Siro crowd restless, the manner of the win may matter as much as the points.
Shakhtar threw everything at the closing stages. Newerton and Mykola Matvienko both forced Josep Martinez into saves in the final minutes, and Inter's defence — reorganised around Manuel Akanji — blocked, headed and scrambled their way to the whistle. Thuram and Petar Sucic also collected yellows, and Oleh Ocheretko and Marlon Gomes were booked for the visitors, on a night when NBC Sports' live updates tracked Inter's desperation across the late window.
So what: Inter off the mark, Bastoni banned
Inter's first three points lift them off the foot of the league-phase table and into the hunt for the top 24 and a play-off place, with five matches to recover a campaign that looked dead at 68 minutes. Shakhtar stay on four points — a win, a draw and now this defeat — and remain inside the play-off places, but they will know this was the one that got away.
The costs for Inter are real: Bastoni's suspension rules him out of the Matchday 4 trip to Feyenoord on 3 November. Shakhtar, meanwhile, host Sporting CP in the early game that same day, in a fixture that now looks pivotal for both clubs' play-off maths.
Beyond the Final Whistle: sometimes a season turns on nine minutes. Bastoni's red card should have buried Inter; instead it produced their bravest goal and their first points, from a 37-year-old substitute's pass and a full-back's finish. Chivu needed a night that proved this squad still believes — he got one, the hard way. Can Inter build a run from this, or was it one night of defiance? Let us know in the comments.
