The sad and lonely binary of Simone Inzaghi

When it was difficult to predict the trend even during the same match, changeable like the climate on certain days in March, they called it “crazy Inter”, an aspect that became so identifying as to end up in a hymn. But the years go by and things change. For a few weeks, not to say a few months, Inter ended up in the worst possible funnel for a team technically still in the running on two and a half fronts: that of predictability. A game played with dedication and attention is generally followed by a careless, botched one, full of mistakes in every part of the field. And systematically, on the sidelines, a figure stands out at the same time nervous and resigned: after almost two years at Inter, Simone Inzaghi looks more and more like a dead man walking. Numbers in hand, the Nerazzurri’s season could be defined as better than, for example, Milan’s: one point less in the league, both in the quarter-finals of the Champions League, but with one more Supercoppa on the bulletin board and a Coppa Italia semi-final still open . But in the moment of worst difficulty, Stefano Pioli had a couple of flashes that reminded us of his presence, sudden changes of course even if only to remind everyone that he is the reigning Italian champion coach (a not insignificant medal being able to put to the chest, unlike Inzaghi).

The Inter coach, on the other hand, continues on his sad and lonely track: a monolithic 3-5-2, the substitutions are always all the same, the striker for the striker, the winger for the winger. Even on the tumultuous evening of Tuesday, when the Nerazzurri seemed to be able to find the advantage, he decided to recall Dimarco and Dzeko, who had become the protagonists of a couple of promising ideas, to insert Gosens and Lukaku, as if the changes were preset by an artificial intelligence and not studied on the basis of the actual needs of the moment. Nothing against the value of the German and the Belgian, but since the raising of the scoreboard by the fourth official there seemed to be two anticlimactic changes, in contrast with the progress of the match.

The impression that Inter conveys is that of a team in which the future represents such a great unknown that it also affects the present: who will be part of tomorrow’s team? The coach, according to rumors, no: from the hypothesis of the ferryman Chivu to those related to possible heirs, Inzaghi was chosen as the designated scapegoat. The trophies collected so far won’t save him, unless we get to lift the Champions League to the sky in Istanbul, against all odds. And even some brilliant intuitions won’t save him, such as reinventing Calhanoglu as director at the time of Brozovic’s long defection. Just the Croatian’s exit from the field during Juventus-Inter seemed emblematic of the period: head shaken in favor of the camera and gaze far from that of the coach. Inter’s scorching April has just begun: a defeat against Fiorentina and a sweaty tie at the Stadium are only the first two commitments of a month that will see the Nerazzurri on the pitch nine times.

Marotta, after pointing out that defeats have many fathers, put in place the umpteenth official defense of the coach: “We have faith in Inzaghi, there is a long-term relationship of trust with him”, only to then remind everyone that the half front remained open in the championship, the parachute of the Champions League placement after the failure in the Scudetto race, is vital for the club’s fate. “Imagining being out would mean reviewing all your plans for next year,” he said before a match that Inter played in a linear fashion against a team that likes to make things difficult for their opponents. Yet the problem is all there: it was yet another discreet performance, without flashes, without inventions, without effective numbers, of a team that would desperately need to give melancholy a kick.