Three matches and three rivals vanquished (even if Adriano Galliani does not completely agree) – Juventus enjoyed a successful week which rejuvenated their Scudetto bid and saw them reach the Coppa Italia final. The week-capping victory over Inter made Juve forget the provincial struggles which has threatened to ensure a potentially unbeaten season likened more to Perugia 1978/79 than Milan 1991/92. It had appeared the January yips which were prevalent in recent campaigns made the shift to February following a [...]

What another whirlwind 24 hours in the land of Pazza Inter. In a move that shocked some but was expected by many, Claudio Ranieri was relieved of his managerial duties late Monday evening.  It was a decision that had been a long time coming and could be argued that the ax should have been dropped sooner.  While Ranieri was able to pull the Nerazzurri out of the relegation places in the first half of the season, the same blistering form [...]

Then there was one. After the first set of games in the round of 16 it looked like Italy would have at least two, if not three teams in the quarterfinals. After Inter’s dismal showing against Marseille, and Chelsea’s comeback against Napoli, Milan remain the only Italian team in all of Europe. It didn’t get any easier for the peninsula as Milan were handed a big task. To make it to the semi-finals they first have to face Barcelona for [...]

Tuesday night’s Coppa Italia match between Milan and Juventus was a fantastic advert for the Italian game. This season’s two best teams by some distance, eights point to be exact, played out an entertaining draw at Juventus’s new and impressive stadium. There were goals, two splendid ones at that, and the two strongest sets of players in the Serie A on display. Off the field guiding their troops forward were two coaches who represent the best of a new generation [...]

After the summer transfer window shut on August 31, 2011, most Interisti were relieved to see Wesley Sneijder was still an Inter Milan player.  Sneijder’s summer holiday locale of Los Angeles was fitting, as the drama surrounding him was suited for Hollywood.  Everyone needed to know if Inter’s Number 10 was staying or would soon be on his way to Manchester. It was decided that Samuel Eto’o was the one to be sold to Anzhi in Russia and Sneijder would [...]

“This is like a marriage, the husband is always the last person to know what the wife is doing.” That is how Claudio Ranieri described his position as Inter manager after the club’s most recent match on Sunday, a 2-2 draw with Catania at the San Siro. The comments came after he was asked about the possibility of being fired by president Massimo Moratti, amidst what seems to be never-ending speculation. In truth, it is the type of speculation that [...]

Italian football is on a high. After years in the mires, more than partly brought about due to the calciopoli scandal of 2006, there is reason for hope. One aspect of this hope is embodied in the fact that the Serie A, for the first time since the mid-1990’s, has more representatives in the Champions League knockout stages than either England’s Premier League or Spain’s La Liga. For a league that has fallen down the pecking order, evidenced by its [...]

When the Champions League draw of sixteen took place nearly three months ago, Inter were deemed to have the easiest match-up of the three remaining Italian teams.  Napoli drew Chelsea, Milan had Arsenal, and Inter were facing Marseille. Both Napoli and Milan finished second in their group and the showdown between the two remaining powerhouse Premier League teams left everyone salivating.  The two Italian clubs shocked many outside of Italy, beating their opponents quite handily with 3-1 and 4-0 score [...]

It was barely two years ago that Inter, guided by the inextricable genius of Jose Mourinho, were the proud torch bearers of Italian football. As Milan were embarrassingly crushed 4-0 at Manchester United and as Juventus failed to even progress past the group stages, against the odds, the Nerazzurri overcame Barcelona, Bayern Munich and Chelsea as they went on to claim European football’s most coveted prize, the Champions League. As the old cliché goes, a week in football is a [...]

Not the best of weeks for Claudio Ranieri at Inter as his team suffered yet another loss, this time to lowly Novara. The defeat capped of a miserable run of results for the Nerazzurri which has seen them claim just one point in their last four fixtures. Incredibly, after defeating Inter early in the season, the Biancoazzurri have claimed a most unlikely double over the 2010 Champions League winners.  Earlier in the season the loss to Novara cost Gian Piero [...]

If you told a group of people at the start of the season that Novara would beat Internazionale twice in 2011/12 you’d have been laughed out of the room. The fantasy became a reality on Sunday, however, when the relegation-threatened Biancoazzurri left the Giuseppe Meazza with another Nerazzurri scalp. Novara put three past Inter in September, but last weekend they needed just a solitary goal to deepen the Nerazzurri’s mid-season mire. Things looked grim on paper. Novara were firmly rooted [...]

Claudio Ranieri has come out and declared that he is not in danger of being sacked. He has also stated that star midfielder Wesley Sneijder is happy at the club, in an attempt to quell rumours of interest from abroad in the Dutch playmaker (for what seems to be the 100th time). “Could he be on his way to Anzhi? As far as I’m concerned, and I hope the player too, no,” Ranieri was quoted as saying on Inter’s official [...]