Former Roma and Manchester City striker Edin Dzeko is set to be in Inter’s starting eleven for this evening’s Coppa Italia semifinal second leg against Juventus.
This according to today’s print edition of Rome-based newspaper Corriere dello Sport, via FCInterNews, who report that the 37-year-old Bosnian international is the favourite to start the match alongside Lautaro Martinez in attack, ahead of Romelu Lukaku.
Inter coach Simone Inzaghi is largely set to go with what he sees as his strongest possible starting eleven in this evening’s match, given the significance of a place in the Coppa Italia final being up for granted.
For the most part this means that the coach’s decisions have already long been made regarding who starts.
However, the one real selection dilemma has concerned whether Dzeko or Lukaku would start.
There have been more than a few suggestions that the Belgian could be the one to be given the nod off the back of his match-winning second half performance against Empoli over the weekend.
However, it has always looked likely that the plan would be that Dzeko, who was fully rested against Empoli on Sunday afternoon, would be the player chosen to lead the line alongside Martinez from the first whistle.
Simone Inzaghi does tend to be a coach with a specific strategy for rotating the squad when the fixture list gets particularly hectic, and in this respect the fact that Dzeko didn’t start or even come off the bench against Empoli appeared to be quite a telling hint.
As a matter of fact, Sunday’s match was the only one in the entire season where the Bosnian did not play a single minute in this entire season, even though he was fit to do so.
Accordingly, a start against the Bianconeri looks likely for Dzeko, the Corriere reports.
