It was at Holland’s training camp last month, before their friendly matches against Switzerland and Germany, that Wesley Sneijder decided to give a different take on why Inter have got off to their worst start since 1925.
Some had chosen to blame Gian Piero Gasperini for imposing the 3-4-3 formation on which he had established his reputation at Genoa and the intransigence he showed in refusing to adapt and change it when results weren’t forthcoming.
Others laid the responsibility with Inter president Massimo Moratti for making the appointment in the first place when he must have known that Gasperini’s tactics were apparently so ill-suited to the players at his disposal.
The inevitable dismissal that followed and the absence of an immediate resurgence under Gasperini’s replacement Claudio Ranieri revealed what everyone had suspected for some time. Inter’s problems went much deeper, and it was this that Sneijder alluded to when broaching the subject while on international duty.
Forced focus
After a horrible start, Inter has slowly pulled themselves away from the drop zone. Whether it's enough to challenge for top three remains to be seen.
| Month | Games | Point |
|---|---|---|
| September | 3 | 4 |
| October | 4 | 4 |
| November | 2 | 6 |
“The principal problem is the difference between the starters and the reserves,” he said.
When Sneijder returned to Italy later that week, he claimed to have been mistranslated. Tellingly, though, he did not distance himself from the comments. Instead he elaborated on them.
“I only said that Inter have had to play almost all their games this year with the same team, with games coming every three days and this has inevitably influenced our performances. So it’s tough, but I have confidence in our group of players.”
To give Sneijder credit, he had a point. As ever, Inter were dependent on the same aging core. At that time, their captain, Javier Zanetti had been ever present. Esteban Cambiasso had missed only one game. Yet the remaining elements of José Mourinho’s 2010 treble-winners from Julio Cesar, Douglas Maicon and Walter Samuel to Thiago Motta, Dejan Stankovic and Diego Milito were blighted by injuries.
No fewer than 10 injuries have been muscle-related and not for the first time fingers have been pointed at the club’s medical staff.
What Sneijder was really getting at, of course, was the lack of depth at Inter and how the new recruits weren’t picking up the slack. This time last year, a frustrated Rafa Benítez gave the club an ultimatum to either buy four players in January or speak to his agent and find another solution.
Moratti plumped for the latter. He brought in Leonardo, but he did take the hint and got his checkbook out to sign Giampaolo Pazzini and Andrea Ranocchia, as well as Yuto Nagatomo and Houssine Kharja initially on loan. Inter rallied to finish second and won the Coppa Italia.
Come the summer, however, Inter resumed their austerity policy, and not without reason. Their deficit needed addressing and fast if the club was to be financial fair-play compliant, so for a second year in a row, Inter cashed in on one of their star players. After Mario Balotelli’s departure for Manchester City in 2010, Samuel Eto’o was allowed to leave for Anzhi Makhachkala.
It was clear that this marked a change in transfer policy. From now on, it seemed Inter would have to sell to buy. Saras, the Sardinian-based energy company run by the Moratti family, had seen its margins and share price fall as the refinement of crude oil became more expensive and the capital that had once been made available by Inter’s owners to cover negative balances now appeared less forthcoming. Considering the current economic climate and how Moratti has shelled out close to three quarters of a billion euros on Inter since assuming control of the club in 1995, that’s more than understandable.
Purse strings needed tightening. Inter needed to become self-sustainable. To put that into some kind of perspective, their net spend this season, even after adding eight players to their squad, has been just $68,000.
And yet, when their accounts were released in October, Inter still announced an operating loss of $135m. It was even bigger than the previous year, partly because commercial and broadcast revenue has fallen.
So one can forgive Moratti any reluctance to dip into his pockets again after Christmas, although it might be necessary, because Inter can ill-afford not to finish in the top three and miss out on qualifying for the Champions League.
A couple of weeks ago, he said that Inter would wait and see before making any moves. “I believe it was right to focus on young players,” Moratti explained, “but if that turns out not to be enough then in January we’ll intervene.”
The young players he was referring to are Philippe Coutinho, Ricardo Álvarez and Luc Castaignos.
Acquired for $20m, their integration has not been easy. Coutinho had been forgotten under Gasperini even though he could point to the fact that he had never been on the losing side in the 10 Serie A games he played for Inter last season, while Álvarez and Castiagnos have both had less time to adapt. They had arrived in the summer and were still learning the ropes.
“Like Coutinho or Mauro Zárate, at times Álvarez does things in training that leaves your mouth open,” Ranieri explained. The same could be said of Castaignos. “He shows really good things in training, he plays very well,” Sneijder revealed. “Then during a game he lacks a little bit of luck, he seems stuck and nervous, but this is normal when you have just turned 19, his qualities are not in discussion.”
There was a sense of frustration, as with a crisis of historic proportions, Inter needed all of their players to step up to the plate. Ranieri, however, didn’t want to expose them to too much pressure too early. “In the most difficult moments, it’s the young players who have to wait and it’s up to me to use them at the right moment so they don’t get burned,” he told RAI.
With Inter decimated by injuries, he had no choice but to throw them in at the deep end. It was sink or swim, and in recent weeks the young trio have done more than keep their heads above water.
When Sneijder hurt himself in the warm-up before Inter’s match with Cagliari on November 19, Ranieri gave Coutinho the nod, and he didn’t disappoint. He scored what would prove to be the winning goal for his team, cutting in from the left-hand side to angle a shot into the corner in a 2-1 victory.
It started a chain reaction.
Three days later, Álvarez opened his Inter account, exchanging a give and go with Milito before deftly sweeping the ball past Trabzonspor goalkeeper Tolga Zengin. The match ended 1-1, and Álvarez had ensured that his team qualified for the knock out stages of the Champions League with a game to spare.
Then it was Castaignos’s turn to be decisive. Inter were drawing 0-0 at Siena the following Sunday and desperately needed to break the deadlock. As the clock struck 89 minutes, he received a ball from Thiago Motta with his back to goal, swiveled and got his shot away so quickly Zeljko Brkic had no chance. Inter won 1-0, and Ranieri likened his match-winner to David Trezeguet.
In the space of a week Coutinho, Álvarez and Castaignos hadn’t just turned their personal seasons around but that of their club too. Unbeaten in their last four games, Inter have recorded back-to-back victories for the first time in Serie A this season. It’s their best run of the campaign so far.
But problems still remain and can’t be wiped out in seven days.
It can be argued, of course, that Inter are in transition in much the same way that Chelsea are in the Premier League. The short-termism of their strategy first under Roberto Mancini and then José Mourinho has allowed a group of players to whom Inter owe their success to slowly grow old together. The bond that comes with that has made moving them on a decision few are prepared to take, not least an owner as sentimental as Moratti.
Against Lille on November 2, Inter fielded a team with an average age of 31 years and 317 days, the oldest in Champions League history. Many have written them off because of it. “I heard that said about Milan then they won the Scudetto last season,” Cambiasso retorted. “They also said the same thing about Pirlo who is now making the difference for Juventus. Now they’re saying it about us. Hopefully within a few months they will no longer be able to say it because we’ll have won something.”
That remains to be seen. But it mustn’t be forgotten that Inter reacted brilliantly in the second half of last season. They won 17 of their remaining 21 games in Serie A, so a run like that is not beyond them. Nor is it beyond Ranieri, who achieved similar results in his first season at Roma and has impressed the need to make “giant steps” from now on, starting on Saturday night at home to Udinese.
This team still has something to give. Inter certainly aren’t past it yet, but they’re reaching the end of a cycle. It appears that has gradually dawned on them, but there are positives to be found. Inter, though still 15th in Serie A, seem to have already touched rock bottom this season but have yet to reach the peak of their potential.
Neither, mind you, have Coutinho, Álvarez and Castaignos, and that can only bode well for the future.
