Milan 0, Inter 0: Until the Death

The Curva Sud proved once again that they deserve to be in the Champions League of coreografia. Their clever, well-executed and amazing coreo proclaiming “Until the Death” made Inter’s pathetic coreo look like an 80 year-old woman designed it. One was worthy of the fierce battle that would play out over the next 90 minutes, one wouldn’t even make a Hallmark greeting card. And so it was that Milan fought to the death, while Inter made their own life difficult for them and had nothing to smile about at the end of the match. Despite the fact that Inter physically dominated much of the match, Milan held them off… until the death.

Fierce

I feel like Inter’s coreo being a flower with the inscription “and smile through the tough times, the way you never did before” was more a message to themselves in the future, for after the match. After Icardi had scored six goals in two matches, his performance today was enough to make any Interista cry, not that that’s very hard to do.

The opposite of fierce

It was all Inter for the first 20 minutes, up through Cancelo’s yellow, the first of four for Inter in this match. But in the 22nd, Calhanoglu took a brilliant free kick that Bonucci just got his head on, only to see Handanovic make an equally brilliant save. That was our first shot of the match, and one of our best. Six minutes later, Bonaventura would send a great little backheel pass in for Cutrone, who took the shot, only to have Handanovic save it once again.

So close

The highlight of the first half, though, was when Icardi scored in the 38th. I was already incredibly nauseated and trying to come to terms with the goal when Di Bello signaled for VAR to review the goal. Miraculously, he came back to the pitch and called the goal back for offside. No way that goal would have been called back without VAR. It was delicious to watch Inter fans start their tears. And it apparently renewed Icardi’s curse of not being able to score against Milan, too. Thank you, VAR.

Gattuso choosing a striker from our three viable starters is always difficult, but a death in the family for Silva sadly simplified things for the Mister, and he chose Cutrone to start over Kalinic. Cutrone repaid that nod throughout the match, but especially in stoppage time at the half, when he ran the full length of the pitch to defend a speedy Candreva. Then in the 68th, he scored an overhead bicycle kick, only to see it also called back for offside. At that point Gattuso chose to replace him with Kalinic, unfortunately.

Not today, sewage snake

Icardi missed two absolutely ridiculous chances, one in the 56th and another in the final minute of stoppage time. He could have easily won the game for his team, even could have had a hat trick again quite easily. But he didn’t. Because he couldn’t. Because he sucks. And he sucks worse than Milan, who in the second half dominated as Inter fizzled out. All in all we would take 13 shots with three on goal, whereas they had 14 shots but only two on goal.

It wasn’t Milan’s finest hour, but it was a testament in endurance and defending for our lives. For a second time in two games, we saw the deficiency of our bench, with Montolivo not able to shine Biglia’s shoes while deputizing for him and our subs a significant downgrade from those they replaced. Gattuso was complimentary to Inter, saying they deserved more, but I take issue with that statement. For however much they outplayed us, we defended harder. The chances were almost equal, and even if they had 56% possession for the match, they were unable to convert anything and take more than a point. Which means we earned our point, even if we also didn’t earn more.

Battle weary warriors

It was a fierce battle in the trenches of the San Siro. If the match were decided on coreo, Milan would have mopped the pitch with Inter’s losing tears. But the match was decided on the pitch, and as the team with no bench, Milan’s efforts showed that they actually gave more, even if the result was even. I personally was very impressed with how they pushed harder for the last 30 minutes, especially after fading on Saturday against Juventus. They showed that they were worthy of the fierce coreo their fans honored them with, and played until the death.

This post inspired by the music of Cigarettes After Sex’s “Sweet”

Our next match is

Serie A Week 31

Milan vs. Sassuolo

Sunday, April 8 • 20:45 CEST (2:45pm EDT)