Inter Milan dreamed of a European cup and found themselves with a capital question mark: their star coach Antonio Conte left a big doubt about his future, after the defeat in the final of the Europa League.
“Conte, are you leaving?” Asked the Gazzetta dello Sport on Saturday, while Corriere dello Sport are already saying “goodbyes” for the coach recruited last year to bring the Nerazzurri back to the top.
By evoking “the future of Inter with or without” him, Antonio Conte, 51, seemed to take a step towards the exit, at the end of a successful season in the field (2nd in the championship at 1 point from the ‘unbeatable Juventus) but accompanied by recurring tensions with its leaders.
“It has been a very difficult season, from all points of view, we will take the best decision for the good of Inter,” said on Sky Sport the ex-coach of Juventus (3 league titles between 2012 and 2014) and Chelsea (champion in 2017). While advancing the importance of his “family” in relation to his next decision.
Conte’s bitterness goes far beyond the sole disappointment of a lost final (2-3) against Sevilla.
At the beginning of August, already, after the last league match in Bergamo, the blood coach had attacked his leaders head-on: he had accused them of having “never protected” neither him nor the players, when they were criticized and received ” packages of m… “. While promising, annoyed, “discussions with the president, but he is in China”.
During the season, he had already openly criticized certain choices made by his leaders on recruitment, especially in early November after another 3-2 defeat in Dortmund, which plagued his career in the Champions League.
The beautiful summer in C3 and the return to Europe of young Chinese President Steven Zhang (28) to attend the last two European matches in Germany seemed to have calmed things down a bit.
The managing director Giuseppe Marotta, with whom relations are not in good shape according to the press, had also cleared the ground by assuring Monday that “everything was forgotten” of the burning statements of the coach.
Obviously not on the side of Conte: “I am not going backwards. If we can improve things, we will do it, otherwise we will see. I do not want another year like that,” said the coach on Sky Sport, while thanking its leaders and rejecting any “resentment”.
It therefore seems far from the “very positive assessment” mentioned Friday evening by President Steven Zhang who, without commenting on the future of Conte, praised his “good work”.
The finalization will not take long, Inter cannot afford to remain in the dark for too long as the next Serie A season is already advancing (September 19). The coach evoked “2, 3 days of vacation” before meeting his leaders and deciding, “with a rested head”.
If he was ultimately to stay, that would likely be accompanied by changes in the organization of the Lombard club.
In the event of departure, one of the points to be clarified will relate to the conditions of the separation, knowing that the former Italian coach, under contract until 2022, receives an extraordinary salary in Italy, estimated at more than 10 million per season.
To replace him, Inter apparently has an option already well advanced: the Italian press has been talking about the name of Massimiliano Allegri for a few weeks, who already succeeded him on the bench of Juventus in 2014, adding five consecutive titles to the three won by Conte.
Without a club since his departure from Turin in 2019, “Max” Allegri would have for mission to succeed where Conte failed: to finally dethrone Juve, whose new season, with a novice coach (Andrea Pirlo) on the bench, promises to be it too is surmounted by a funny question mark.
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