Fiorentina hero Kalinic revels in 'best game of his life'

Nikola Kalinic described his performance in Fiorentina's 4-1 win over Inter as the "best game of his life" after he scored a hat-trick to fire his side to the top of Serie A.

Kalinic won the penalty which Josep Ilicic converted for his side's opening goal, before scoring three times to end the visitors' 100 per cent record in the league.

He told Goal: "It is a great feeling, this was best game of my life! Everyone has called me and wants to congratulate me.

"I've heard I am the first Croatian player since [Alen] Boksic for Lazio in 1995 to score a hat-trick in Serie A - I am very glad."

Fiorentina appointed Paulo Sousa as their new coach in the summer after sacking Vincenzo Montella in June, but Kalinic has revealed his boss refused to get carried away with the win.

He added: "Sousa is a great man and a great coach. He congratulated us and nothing more, there is no time to celebrate with so many matches ahead of us.

"We really outplayed Inter, ruled on the pitch and proved we deserve to be on top!"

Kalinic, 27, joined the club from Dnipro in the summer and he says he has been delighted with his start to life in Serie A.

"I have started well in Italy, I just have to continue at this level," he continued.

"The league is hard, I already knew that but now I can really feel it. Every game is tough, there is not a lot of space and it is physically very demanding. But the coach keeps rotating so all of us are satisfied and not too tired."