Luca Ranieri heaped praise on the team in the wake of their battling display against Como.

“We're happy to have produced a massive performance. The whole team deserves credit. We've been through a difficult spell and we needed a performance like this against a top team. We dug in and defended like a great team and we attacked with real intent. We must keep our heads down and keep working away. On Thursday we have a very tough away trip but we head home with a big smile on our faces today.

“We're in the relegation zone so we need to perform like this in every match, never giving an inch, fighting together as one. We'll make mistakes but we must keep going and overcome them as a team, as we did today.

“To a man, we were superb out there. The strikers helped loads defensively we defenders tried to be as compact as possible. Against an excellent team we produced a near perfect performance. It's a shame about the goal we conceded but our opponents have a lot of quality. This is a huge morale boost for us going into all the big matches we still have to play.

“We've dropped so many points, especially to injury-time goals, so today it felt great to batten down the hatches and weather the storm together. This has to be the way forward.”