The Ultimate Inter Line-up Of All Time - Who Made The Squad?

A couple of weeks ago while watching clips of old Inter matches on YouTube I started thinking about who would be in my ultimate starting line up of all time, this wasn't quite as easy as i thought it would be as the more i thought about it the more quality players from Inter's history came to mind and I ended up with a 8-10-6 formation which of course is ridiculous & I may as well have just written a post about all the greats of Inter's history, which would be a very long job so i decided to find out who my fellow Interista would say deserved to be in the ultimate line-up.  To keep things consistent i decided to go with the formation that i feel suits Inter's players the best, so i asked my followers on Facebook & Twitter what their ultimate line-up would be on a 4-3-1-2 formation and i got some great replies, though it soon became clear that certain players were on pretty much all the answers, meaning that again i ended up with more players than i needed so the line-up is made up of the most voted for 11.

A week of Interviews for the Nerazzurri

The world's press has been focused on Inter in the last week or so with the Sneijder transfer saga & the Calcioploi accusations against Facchetti, but the squad at the pre season training camp at Pinzolo have been concentrating on building their fitness & adapting to new coach Gasperini's tactics.  Although the main point of the camp is to get the players and staff ready for the upcoming season there has been a very fan friendly feel to the whole thing with Intersta flocking in their thousands to get a glimpse of their heroes training & also there has been various evening events around the camp to entertain and enthrall the fans present including various appearances by Nerazzurri stars & Gasperini it has just emphasised the whole Inter family philosophy that we are so proud of.

Eto'o & Milito seal Coppa Italia Final with a 3-1 win against Palermo

Inter end the season with their 3rd & 4th trophies of the season, this years Coppa Italia final was a battle to secure not just the Coppa Italia trophy but also a special trophy to celebrate the 150th anniversary of the unification of Italy.

Inter 3-1 Catania Last Game of League Season Secures 12th Home Win In A Row

The last game of the league season meant a convincing win for the Nerazzurri over Catania and also secured Inter's 12th home win in a row with a brace from Giampaolo Pazzini and an awesome effort from Yuto Nagatomo. Some say Inter have had a disastrous season but in fact that is not true as 2nd place with 76 points and 69 goals in the league is hardly disastrous but I'll go into details of the season more after the Coppa Italia final in my season review, but for now let's concentrate on how Inter ended the season on a high.

1000 Career Apperances For Javier Zanetti

Tonight's Coppa Italia 2nd leg match against Roma will see our great captain enter the record books once again by joining the few players in football history to play 1000 professional games, for me he is the perfect player that any team would love to have he has bags of ability and stamina, he's a great leader of his team and most importantly he is extreemly loyal, his 16 year career at Inter proves he loves this great club of ours as much as every Interista on the planet and he would fight all the way to acheive Inter's dreams and goals.  Footballers around the world should take a leaf out of his book and play for the love of their club over their love for the money, but in this respect Zanetti is a rarity in the modern game and for his continued comitment to Inter we salute him as one of Inter's all time greats!

Inter back in 2nd with a 2-1 win over Lazio

Happy Easter to all Interista, and to make the weekend more special Inter managed to claim all three points from Lazio even though we were down to 10 men with goals coming from Sneijder's 4th of the season and Eto'os 33rd. The downside is after Julio Cesar's red card it means we are without our first choice keeper for the next game on the bright side its against Cesena. The other piece of bad news is that Stankovic had to go off with an injury. Milan beat Brescia with a late goal to put them back to 8 points ahead though with Palermo beating Napoli we have gone above them to reclaim 2nd place, which if we end up finish there I will be happy considering the bad season we've had.

Coppa Italia 1st Leg Roma 0-1 Inter Match Report & Reactions

Inter finally got the result they needed after 5 losses in a row, which puts them in a strong position to progress to the final after the second leg at the Guiseppe Meazza on the 11th May. Dejan Stankovic was the man to get the goal for the Nerazzurri with another superb long range effort from outside the box on the stroke of half time, this was in fact his 2nd goal of the game after his first got ruled out by a questionable refereeing decisions in the opening minutes. Both sides had their chances in the second half but the scoreline of 0-1 stayed the same. Inter looked by far the stronger side throughout the game but even saying that they were still no where near the level we know they are capable of, this win should however give them the confidence to finish the season on a good note, hopefully!!! My one criticism of the match was the fact that Leonardo paired Milito up front with Pandev instead of Pazzini the subbed Milito for Pazzini which is a shame as i was looking forward to seeing how Milito & Pazzini would play together but to be fair Pandev had a good game, he didn't score or have any particularly good shots on the goal but he did work hard bringing the ball into attack.

Parma v Inter match report & reactions

This really is getting beyond a joke now, as Inter wrote off pretty much any chance they had for the Scudetto this season and the 2-0 defeat to Parma puts the Nerazzurri a huge 8 points behind Milan with 5 games to go. As always I'm right behind Inter but unless Milan mess up 3 of the last 5 games, which isn't very likely, Inter's only remaining chance of silverware this season depends on the Coppa Italia semi finals against Roma. Unfortunately I didn't get to see the match but from what I've heard and read I'm glad I didn't see it, but from what I can tell it is down to two factors firstly Leonardo's crap tactics including his insistence of playing Pandev & Chivu and starting Sneijder on the bench while leaving Maicon out of the squad completely?!? The second I can only assume is down to frustrations of the recent bad results coming through in the players performances. Anyway here's the match report and what Leonardo & co had to say....

Shalke 2-1 Inter (Agg 7-3) Champions league quarter final match report & reactions

That's it the reigning champions are out of the competition after an embarrassing 7-3 agg defeat to Shalke, obviously the worst of the damage was done in the 1st leg but even after all the talk from the Inter camp about believing in being able to turn it around on the night only a handful of Inter players looked like they had the passion to win, yes we had the majority of possession and our passing was good but there was no creativity and there was a definite spark missing from our finishing our only goal of the game was more fluke than intention when Motta managed to get a touch that bounced into the net. The most impressive Inter player again for me was Yuto Nagatomo who never gave up and put 110% in to trying to create something for the Nerazzurri. So who's to blame? .......

Shalke v Inter Preview Champions league quarter final 2nd leg

Here we are just a few hours from the 2nd leg of the Champions league quarter finals against Shalke, (cue the Mission Impossible music) and already most people have written off our chances of progressing to the semis but is it really that impossible for Inter to pull off the comeback again in Germany?  Everyone at Inter and all us Nerazzurri faithful don't seem to think so, i mean if they can score 5 against us in the 1st leg then why should it be so unlikely that we can get 4 tonight?  As long as Leonardo puts a bit of emphasis and pace in the defense like he did against Chievo last weekend there's no reason why we can't show the Germans the door, and as an extra boost for Inter Walter Samuel is in the squad for the first time since his injury in November, though i really think Leonardo shouldn't play him in this match and risk him, that said i don't see anything wrong with putting him on for the last 10 minutes just to get him some competitive match practice.

Inter 1-1 Roma (Agg 2-1) Coppa Italia Semi Final 2nd Leg

Not only did Inter ensure they made it to the the Final of the Coppa Italia against Palermo but Javier Zanetti played his 1000th career game.  It was a good game with Inter looking fairly lively throughout but still lacking something up front with Sneijder still out injured and Eto'o spending most of the game tracking back and covering the left wing, he did however secure his 35th goal of the season and ensured the Nerazzurri got through to the final with a 2-1 agg win

Inter v Shalke match report & reactions

What can i say about last nights Champions league quarter final first leg tie against Shalke?  Well let's start with the positives, firstly Milito is back in the starting line up and scored for us and second is Stankovic's wonder goal from 40 yards out in the first 25 seconds of the match (if you missed it see the video above)  Unfortunately that was as good as it got for Inter as the two goals we got during the first half were cancelled out by two goals for Shalke before half time, after half time things went from bad to worse for the Nerazzurri and in a similar style to the derby defeat at the weekend, Shalke managed to make us look like complete amatuers instead of world champions and for the second game in a row Chivu saw a red card yet again weakening our already shaky backline, which was also suffered the blow of an own goal by Ranocchia.  So after another terrible performance by Inter the game ended 2-5 to Shalke meaning that Inter need at least 4 goals on the return leg meaning the mighty Nerazzurri are effectively out of the running for making it through to the semi's. 

So who's to blame? The official verdict from Inter's camp is that the players are fatigued which i can understand after last years amazing run and the world cup followed by loads of injuries and the ridiculous amount of matches played in 2011 so far, but with the squad Inter has at it's disposal that excuse only goes so far to explain this awful week.  The true reason in my opinion is the management as we know the first half of the season was destroyed by Benitez who couldn't organise a pub team let alone anything else then things looked better when Leonardo took over at Christmas but over the last month or so it is becoming more apparent that his tactics only favour an attacking mentality and he seems to give no thought to the defensive side of the team and considering how strong our defense was last season there is no excuse for this and as much as i hate to say it come the end of the season he has to go to be replaced with a manager that can balance the team properley.

AC Milan v Inter match review & reactions

Last night the derby didn't go according to plan for the Nerazzurri, the match started badly when straight from the kick off Inter were caught sleeping as Milan flew out of the starting blocks and Pato hit the back of the net in just 45 seconds. After that Inter took about 30 minutes to start looking like they could reply but it wasn't meant to be as in the second half Chivu got a red card after which Milan seemed to run rings around Inter which was shown when Pato netted his second, the kick in the teeth really came on 88 minutes when Zanetti gave away a penalty that Cassano put away finishing the game 3-0. All in all it was a terrible match for Inter with Sneijder & Eto'o hardly affecting the game, there were two positives though firstly Julio Cesar had a great game and was Inter's man of the match for me as if it wasn't for him it could have easily been 6-0 to Milan. The second is that the Guiseppe Meazza pitch looked much better after being returfed.

Inter v Lecce match report and reactions

After week 30 of this Serie A season Inter are now only 2 points behind league leaders AC Milan and the race for the Scudetto is now well and truly on. But they need to play much better than they did today in the Derby after next weeks international break. There was a spark of creativity and flair missing from today's game but as I said in my preview I was expecting Inter to ease off a bit for this match and to be fair they got the result that was needed to take full advantage of Milan's slip up last night.

Inter's reactions to Champions League draw

Following Inter's draw with Shalke, the team considered to be the weakest in the last 8 of this years competition, we can consider ourselves fortunate we didn't get one of the big teams and hopefully qualifying for the semis should be a walk in the park for us as long as the players don't get complacent.  See what various representatives of Inter had to say on the draw.....

Inter demolish Genoa with 5 second half goals

Inters week 28 5-2 victory over Genoa marks the seventh victory of Leonardo's Nerazzurri era, and just proves that Inter are very dangerous in front of goal and they are more than capable of taking all the titles again this season, we just need to stay focused on our targets and not get complacent.