WORDS: DIEGO DURANTINI
PHOTOGRAPHY: THEO MCINNES
Supporting Inter is not for everyone ...
In Italy, like in the United Kingdom, football pervades every aspect of society. As a young Italian boy approaching 10 years of age, supporting a football team was a must – and I needed to pick: but which one?
Choosing a team to support might at first glance seem an easy task. You might pick your local team – I loved to support FC K.ln when I lived in the German carnival city and now my work has taken me to Norfolk in the UK, I follow Norwich City.
Or you could choose because your family supports a certain team, or just because a certain colour combination is luring you in. Surely a young boy growing up in Italy would be sensitive to the call of a winning team, which would make you a winner by association and gives you bragging rights over your peers – a nice perspective indeed.
And then there are those rebels that do not conform to a script.
They do not want to be like everyone else. They do not enjoy easy wins but rather are attracted by sacrifice and a hint of pain and suffering when supporting your team. Well, if like me, you recognise yourself in that description and you had been born in Italy, chances are you would have become a fan of FC Internazionale.
Supporting Inter is not for everyone. It requires perseverance, strength and the ability to withstand the most burning delusions. It forces you to cope with the palpitations that come from last minute goals as well as the grit to keep on trying without losing faith and passion.
Supporting Inter is a life-long rollercoaster ride with few (and far apart) exhilarating highs, separated by winning droughts and last-minute debacles that would demoralise the most stubborn of fans.
Just to be clear, Inter does not hide its unpredictable and frustrating nature. On the contrary, it celebrates it. Inter fans do not see it as a drawback, but as a feature.
Our anthem, always sung at San Siro, is “Pazza Inter, Amala” which translates to “Crazy Inter, Love her”. Inter is like a one-of-a-kind fascinating person, which will fill you with passion and pride one day, for then the next day drives you crazy and makes you scream your lungs out in frustration. If that sounds unbearable, welcome to our world – we love it.
As for many teams, being an Inter fan comes with rivalries, although the anticipation and the mix of fear and trepidation that precedes those games in the heart of any Inter fan is hard to match.
There are two matches each championship season that are circled in red for any Inter fan. The ‘Derby de la Madonnina’, is the match nobody in Milan wants to lose, mainly because that means AC Milan - the “cugini” (cousins) have won. The choreographies prepared by the two opposing “curve” are spectacular, involving thousands of supporters cramming the sectors of San Siro directly behind the goals.
Winning the derby is almost as important in the mind of the fans as winning the championship. The teams, the fans and the city as a whole all feel the tension – it means city supremacy, it means claiming Milano as “your” city, and your team as the legitimate first team of Milano. It is not unlikely that the teams most representative players also go at each other, figuratively of course, as recently a literal clash of titans took place between Ibrahimovic and Lukaku for who could be crowned “King of Milan”.
Derbies are matches like no other.
The rivalry with AC Milan is not the only one that makes the blood of Inter fans boil.
The ‘Derby d’Italia’ is the fixture that sees Turin’s Juventus and Milan’s Inter face off in a tension-heavy match that is more than a simple match. Inter vs Juventus is the clash of two different mentalities to conceive football, one more blue (and black) collar and one more “aristocratic”, one more simple and one more distinguished.
Almost two distinct and opposing life philosophies that are a direct reflection of the cities the teams represent, both invaluable centres of industry and economic power in Italy. And yet, Inter and Juventus are the two Italian teams that won the most Scudetto. Plus, Inter-Juventus is the most played match in the history of Italian football, as until 2006, they were the only teams that had not been relegated to Serie B, at least until Calciopoli overwhelmed Italian football.
When Inter and Juventus clash, controversies are never amiss. The most egregious one took place on a spring evening of late April in Turin in 1998. The two teams fielded unforgettable champions like Zidane, Deschamps and Del Piero on one side, and Zanetti, Simeone and Ronaldo on the other. There is only one point to separate the two clubs on the standings, and four matches to go – basically a championship final. The balance of the match had been broken by some incredible footwork magic by Del Piero – but after that, Inter took possession of the match and kept pushing for the equaliser.
What happened at the 70th minute of that match will be remembered by every Inter fan, forever. In the space of a few seconds, Inter were first denied a penalty when Mark Iuliano clattered Ronaldo, then had one given against them, as Juve broke away and Taribo West felled Del Piero. Arguments raged all the way from the Stadio del Alpi to the Italian parliament. Juventus wrapped the title up a couple of weeks later.
Rivalries are fuelled by passion, and passion is never in short supply among Inter fans.
In a time in which football teams look at reducing stadiums capacity to make sure to have a full-house for every home match, Inter does not need to do so, despite San Siro being able to host in excess of 75,000 fans.
Inter topped Serie A’s attendance for the last nine years and this season is recording an average 95% capacity, showing the unconditional passion and support that Inter fans have for our team.
Passion shows itself also when the team is in need and support, even financial, is not withdrawn.
When the Chinese Inter ownership began having financial troubles and was looking for partners, 50+ personalities and VIPs got together and fundraise among all Inter fans, with the goal to make Inter the first Italian club partly owned by its fans, like the Socios for Barcelona or the Vereinsmitgliedern for Bayern Munich.
This initiative went on to raise almost €250m despite being side-lined by the current Inter ownership, showing how deep, and perhaps irrational, the passion for Inter runs in its supporters’ veins.
Ultimately, Inter fans put their passion for the team and for football more in general, above everything else, even above winning. If winning was all that mattered, then we would have been Juventus fans.