Legendary former Nerazzurri defender Marco Materazzi feels that controversy is surrounding Inter Milan because of their success.
The 2006 World Cup winner spoke to Milan-based newspaper Gazzetta dello Sport in an interview published in today’s print edition, via FCInterNews.
Inter have been at the centre of a bit of a firestorm in the last couple weeks.
The main reason for this was that the Nerazzurri had benefited from a questionable refereeing decision in last weekend’s Serie A win over Hellas Verona.
Inter’s late winner was allowed to stand even though there was an apparent foul by defender Alessandro Bastoni in the buildup.
Meanwhile, Inter had also scored a goal against Genoa the previous weekend in another incident where there was a strong case that VAR should have disallowed it for a foul.
Naturally, these kinds of incidents will be the subject of controversy.
But the degree of the controversy has ballooned well out of proportion to the actual incidents.
In the view of Materazzi, that is just a natural consequence of Inter’s recent success.
Materazzi: Controversy Around Inter The Result Of “Fear”
“The truth is that I see a single objective on everyone’s part,” Materazzi said.
“Bring down Inter, who are the strongest team right now.”
He continued that if there has been controversy recently, “It means that they fear us. Simple.”
“The truth of that match is that Duda did more to deceive the referee than VAR.”
Materazzi argued that “The Verona player was making a mockery of the referee.”
“And when you do that, you risk consequences.”
“I would say there was no doubt that play should’ve been stopped,” Materazzi said.
“But let’s not say that it was an elbow from Bastoni,” he continued.
“That’s not how it was. If anything, it was a shoulder barge.”
“If that was an elbow, then I say that a penalty should have been called for Inter for the push on Bastoni,” he said.
