Inter coach Spalletti has led the Nerazzurri, from being a side that has failed to play in the Champion’s League for large part of the past decade, to returning to the competition. Currently the former Roma coach, has led his team to be on the verge of qualifying for the competition for the second season in a row.
However, despite being third in the Serie A for most of the season, and currently having a five-point lead over AC Milan and Atalanta as well as a six point advantage over Roma, this season has been a draining dramatic roller-coaster for the club, for all the wrong reasons.
Why Should Spalletti Be Sacked?
While Spalletti is not entirely to blame for the off-field Icardashian drama, he has done his best to play the role of Caitlyn Jenner, in this fiasco.
Also, Spalletti has demonstrated personal traits and flaws, which prove without a shadow of a doubt, that in order for Inter and Suning to proceed successfully on their ambitious project, Spalletti must be replaced at the end of the season.
Poor Handling of The ‘Icardashian’ Drama
Removing the captaincy from Icardi, was the right decision at the time he pushed for that move. Off-field comments from Icardi’s agent/wife Wanda Nara had led to rumblings of players being at odds with their “captain” and caused disagreements within the dressing room.
These off-field issues were starting to impact on-field performances and management was forced to make a decision to get everyone on board to fight for another Champion’s League campaign. But when Beppe Marotta had masterfully brokered a peace deal with all the parties involved, and when Icardi had returned to training with the team, Spalletti demanded an apology from him and refused to select Icardi for Lazio match as a punishment.
With Lautaro Martinez injured and the team without a proper target in attack, the team dropped crucial points against Lazio. In the post-match press conference, Spalletti threw Icardi and the club’s management under the bus and made matters significantly worse. While discussing the ongoing negotiations between Icardi and management, he said “these negotiations are humiliating for Inter fans and for those who love Inter. The need to negotiate with someone just to get him to pull on the shirt that they love. It’s humiliating. Negotiating with someone just to get him to pull on the Inter shirt.”
“What, do I need to email 20 lawyers and ask them if I can call someone up? Icardi needs a game out. If he continues to behave the way he has done recently, then he can start to come back in. People say we lost games without Icardi. Inter didn’t get into the Champions League for years with Icardi. Inter lost worse games than this with Icardi. Lionel Messi and Cristiano Ronaldo make the difference, not Icardi, with all due respect. Professionalism and self-respect are everything.”
Although Spalletti made valid points and he has every right to be upset at the childish behavior of Icardi, however knowing the lengths Marotta had to go to just get everyone going in the same direction again to ensure team stays on target, this was a very ill-advised move by Spalletti and it clearly showed he was also the one who had major differences with Icardi.
This was an incredibly unnecessary fanning of the flames, by creating more drama when things were finally starting to cool down and become resolved. Furthermore, with this move he put his own ego ahead of what was best for the team, which ironically, was precisely the very thing he criticized Icardi of doing.
After Spalletti came out strongly against Icardi, he was undoubtedly forced by the club to do an 180-degree u-turn and started Icardi against Genoa only a few days later. Just like that he shamelessly went back on his own words when stating: “Icardi is more valuable than Ronaldo and Messi combined.”
As the club prepares to reinforce the squad in the summer after finally getting over the terms of the Settlement Agreement with UEFA for breaching their Financial Fair Play rules, the team needs a calm, cool and level-headed presence in charge of the team both on and off the field. Spalletti has proven thus far that he is completely incapable of doing that.
Inability To Turn Games Around
In the league, against the top teams like Juventus, AC Milan, Roma, Napoli and Lazio, Spalletti has a fantastic track record since taking over the reigns at Inter. His only losses have come earlier this season away against Juventus and at home last year against the Bianconeri again.
However, in the Champion’s League it’s been a different story. Inter started out strongly at home with a win against Spurs and grabbing a win away at PSV to put themselves in strong position for knockout stage qualification. However the wins didn’t come without hiccups. Both Spurs and PSV were consistently able to create scoring opportunities and carve Inter midfield with ease but failed to convert their chances.
Being in the group of death, all opponents were top notch and capitalized on our mistakes. Against Barcelona same flaws in the midfield remained and Inter failed to create any momentum through the middle and relied heavily on the wingers where Perisic and Politano failed to have the impact we have occasionally seen from them in the league matches. Nerazzurri put up a good fight at Camp Nou despite losing 2-0. In the second leg at Wembley Stadium against Spurs and at home against PSV, Inter needed a win or a draw along with Spurs loss against Barcelona to qualify for knockout rounds.
Inter lost away match to Spurs as Spalletti went with the same game plan as the home leg. Tottenham learned from the mistakes in the first match made adjustments and yet again sliced through the midfield to score the only goal of the match, winning 1-0.
At the time, Inter needed only a draw at Spurs to knock them out of the Champions League and Spalletti clearly went in with the intention of playing for a draw which was evident in the team’s body language on the field. This meant that Inter went into the last group stage match with their destiny in their own hands. You would expect the team to come out firing on all cylinders to grab the three points against a PSV side who were yet to win any matches thus far in the group stages.
However the complete opposite happened. The team was extremely sluggish out the gates and conceded an early goal. Spalletti, having failed to prepare the team was completely incapable to get a reaction from the team and make adjustments despite having the higher quality squad at his disposal compared to PSV. In every match, as higher quality opponents made tactical adjustments, Spalletti either failed to respond or waited far too long to make changes and cost his side matches that remained in balance for majority of the match despite the team’s flaws.
As a manager, instead of being the calming presence, rallying his team to get back into the match, Spalletti always seems lost and panicked. His lack of a Plan B puts the team in further disarray as they instead panic to the point of not even being able to string together simple passes.
This habit of his has been on full-display in the Serie A as well, against mid-table sides, who defend with park-the-bus style tactics and where Inter have been continuously unable to break down their defenses and as a result end up dropping crucial points unnecessarily.
The Way Forward
Therefore, for this Suning project to have credibility, the management need to replace Spalletti with someone who will bring the team together, create harmony in the dressing room, and be that calming presence that allows the team to perform at the highest level, in order to start bringing home trophies.
There are two names currently being thrown around as potential replacements, and these are Antonio Conte and the Special One himself, Jose Mourinho.
In the next three articles in this mini series, a detailed analysis of the two coaches weaknesses and strengths will be analyzed, before finally answering the question who best would fulfill the needs of Inter ahead of the 2019/2020 season.
