How Inter Milan’s historic treble crumbled into the longest, saddest comedown in modern European football

As the best decade in Inter’s history has been followed by one of their worst, they welcome Tottenham Hotspur back to San Siro tonight as almost grateful hosts

The last time Inter Milan hosted Tottenham in the Champions League, they did so as European and Italian champions, and were weeks away from being crowned champions of the world in Abu Dhabi.

There is a wall of plaques outside San Siro for every international title Inter and AC Milan have won; their European cups and Super Cups, their FIFA Club World Cups. There is a gaping space next to the plaque for the 2010 Club World Cup title, as if everyone here thought it would be filled soon enough.

But when you are on top of the world the only way is down. And eight years on from that historic peak, Inter are still trying to drag themselves out of the longest, saddest, comedown in modern European football. Their last Champions League game was here back in March 2012, as Claudio Ranieri tried and failed to squeeze the last drops out of the ageing treble-winning side. They were knocked out by Marseille, and almost seven years on all the Inter fans want is for the team to put themselves back on the map.

As the best decade in Inter’s history has been followed by one of their worst, they welcome Tottenham back to San Siro tonight as almost grateful hosts. Hoping that they can put on a good show before they focus on the real job of finishing third and competing for the Europa League.

That might sound defeatist for a huge club in a special stadium with a handful of match-winners in their side. Ivan Perisic, Radja Nainggolan and Mauro Icardi are top players, and if Spurs can get rolled over at Vicarage Road then they can certainly lose here. But even the fact Inter are playing this game tonight shows that they have finally found their footing again and started to crawl back up.

Because the story of Inter’s post-treble years has been of a club desperately searching for a purpose and a plan. Building upwards is one thing; look at Manchester City or Paris Saint Germain. But trying to stay near the top, or even to manage a controlled descent, is even harder. Massimo Moratti quickly sold up and in 2016 a majority stake was bought by Chinese retail giants Suning. But to get a sense of the bad decisions and bad signings that have coloured this Inter decade, just look at what happened that summer.

Roberto Mancini decided he could not work with the new owners and he left just before the start of the new season. Suning decided that they admired Frank De Boer’s work at Ajax, his stylish possession football, his four Eredivisie titles, the way he brought through and improved youngsters, including Jan Vertonghen, Toby Alderweireld and Christian Eriksen. They turned to De Boer in a panic and he did not sign at Inter until just nine days before their opening game.

De Boer arrived to find none of the stability, trust or values that were his platform to build on at Ajax. Instead he found a badly put-together squad, not least Gabigol, the 19-year-old Inter had paid Santos €35million for, not their only credulous agent-led signing of the last few years. De Boer did not think Gabigol was fit enough to start. The Chinese owners disagreed. They intruded, interfered and undermined their manager. De Boer was sacked after 85 days and 14 games in charge.

Anyone tempted to blame De Boer for not being the right fit for the job should look to the fact that his replacement Stefano Pioli did not make it to the end of the season either.

Gabigol onlu managed one goal for Inter

(Getty)

It is only now, two years on, that it feels as if Suning have finally got the hang of running Inter. San Siro has been a weight on the club, making it hard for them to rake in matchday revenue simply because they do not own it. Juventus building their own stadium is the best thing they ever did but Inter have not been able to do it yet. However, Inter’s attendances have grown from the nadir of 37,000 back in 2014-15 under former owner Erick Thohir, to a healthy 57,000 last year, the biggest in the country. Clever reforms to ticketing and the match-day experience have worked. San Siro is no fun when it is half-empty but last year for the big games Inter were drawing over 60,000 and suddenly the old magic comes back.

Of course it helps that for the first time since Jose Mourinho left – right at the moment of their historic glory – that Inter have a good manager with the backing of the board. Luciano Spalletti has rebuilt the team and on the last day of last season they got back into the Champions League, beating Lazio 3-2 to scrape fourth and make it into this year’s competition.

Inter Milan's last Champions League game was in March 2012

(Corbis via Getty)

They have started to buy better, too – no more Gabigols – and this summer they added some serious experience: Sime Vrsaljko, the right-back who cut through England at the Luzhniki, arrived on loan from Atletico. Nainggolan, Roma’s wrecking ball, made the move north and so did Stefan de Vrij, from Lazio. Keita Balde, once a target for Tottenham, joined from Monaco.

They are not Wesley Sneijder, Samuel Eto’o and Diego Milito. This is not 2009-10. But it is a team again, one worthy of the shirts they wear and which has re-captured the imagination of their disaffected fanbase. The hope is that the ingredients are in now place to move past Roma and Napoli and become Juventus’ main challengers again, just as they used to be. But all of that is for the future. For now all they want to do is hear that music again, savour their place at the table and remember when they were on top of the world.