Derby winner to soar over Italy

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 19/02/2021 (1996 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

The Madonnina, or “Little Madonna,” watches over Milan from her perch atop the Duomo Cathedral on Via Carlo Maria Martini. It’s an unwritten rule in the city that no building should exceed her height, and if one does, it must be crowned by a replica of the statue.

As a result, there are numerous Madonninas in the heavens above the Lombardy capital. There is also a figurative one — that claimed by the city’s superior football team, as determined by a rivalry named, appropriately, the Derby della Madonnina.

It just so happens that the winner of Sunday’s derby encounter (8 a.m. DAZN/TLN) will soar not only above Milan, but high over Italy as well.

Going into Sunday’s match, the Milan pair occupies the top two spots in Serie A. Inter, without the midweek rigours of European football, are first place with 50 points from 22 matches. Milan, having drawn 2-2 at Red Star Belgrade on Thursday, are only a point in arears.

Of course, it’s natural to wonder how Juventus figure in the title race, but a 1-0 defeat away to Napoli the last time out left the reigning champions in fourth with 42 points. They do have a game in hand, but even assuming they win it they’re still five points off the league lead with two-thirds of the season in the books.

It was 2011 the last time the Bianconeri failed to win Serie A. Milan were champions that year, and Inter the five years before that. Its’ almost hard to imagine, or remember, a time when the Maddonina duo sparred for calcio supremacy, and with Juventus expected to retool in the summer and roar back next season, it’s almost certainly not a long-term situation, especially given Inter’s financial woes.

It would hardly be a modern Derby della Maddonina without some off-the-field dramatics, and Inter have obliged to provide them.

The Friday sports dailies were less about the much-anticipated match than the material plights of the Nerrazzuri, whose majority owner, Zhang Jindong, is rumoured to be hoping to sell. British investment firm BC Partners is the prospective buyer, and if a deal can’t be agreed in the short term Jindong has claimed he’ll be forced to take out a €200 million loan — just to get the club through May.

Jindong, a co-founder of the Chinese retailer Suning, has also stated, as per La Gazzetta dello Sport, that from here he will focus primarily on the club’s retail business — which is his specialty — at the expense of those segments he deems “irrelevant.”

In other words, it’s now or never for Inter Milan. There will be no major transfers in the upcoming window; manager Antonio Conte, already dissatisfied at the club, will resign if not pushed out of his job at season’s end.

It’s a rather more secure state of affairs, at least by Italian football standards, at AC Milan. They have the luxury of worrying more about the table than the ledger, although with two losses in their last four matches and three in their last seven, anxiety is mounting.

Atop Serie A for 18 matchdays, and having gone unbeaten in 12 to conclude the previous campaign, the Rossoneri found themselves knocked off their perch for the first time since October last weekend when they lost 2-0 at Spezia. Another defeat would leave them four points off the summit and perhaps concede the Scudetto to Inter. What’s more, a trip to Roma follows next Sunday, so things don’t exactly get easier.

“We have to analyze our games and raise the bar for performances, because this is an important moment in our season,” manager Stefano Pioli told Sky Sports Italia after the Red Star draw. “We can do better.”

Milan, it’s worth pointing out, are only winless in two, although Pioli’s remarks serve to underline both his side’s overall form of the last calendar year and the narrow margins of this season’s title race.

Inter, meanwhile, are coming off a 3-1 win at home to Lazio that put them top, and manager Antonio Conte, notoriously difficult to please, finally seems content with the way his team is playing.

“We have shown that we are starting to be a team with a capital ‘T’,” he told the club’s official TV channel. “Having said that, for us it must be a starting point and certainly not a point of arrival. There are 16 games left; we must continue to work like this.”

If Conte’s remarks sound unusually upbeat, it’s because they are.

Knowing the plight in which the club finds itself, and understanding the delicacy of his own position, he seems to be issuing an “us against everyone” rallying cry for the run-in. If it works for Sunday’s Derby della Madonnina, there may be no looking back for the Nerazzurri — at least until the squad is sold off.

For the time being, at least, the immediacy of their situation will work in Inter’s favour. They’ll expect to win this derby, and this Scudetto, before it almost inevitably all comes apart.

Prospective Milan XI: Donnarumma; Theo, Romagnoli, Kjaer, Calabria; Kessie, Tonali; Rebic, Calhanoglu, Saelemaekers; Ibrahimovic.

Prospective Inter XI: Handanovic; Skriniar, de Vrij, Bastoni; Hakimi, Barella, Brozovic, Perisic; Eriksen; Lukaku, Lautaro.

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