History of the Milan derbies in Europe

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One of the two semi-finals of the current edition of the UEFA Champions League will be played entirely in Milan, between Inter and Milan. The first leg is scheduled at San Siro on Wednesday 10 May, the second leg on Tuesday 16. It will be the third derby in the Champions League between Inter and Milan, about twenty years after the first two, which are still remembered today by those who played them as the longest and most difficult days ever lived in a career.

Those were long days also for the city of Milan, historically divided in half by its two teams. Since then, however, a lot has changed. In those years Inter and Milan were among the greats of European football and were still owned by the two best known and most symbolic Milanese families, at least in their fields: the Morattis and the Berlusconis.

They spent a lot, had many champions among their players and added new ones every year: in particular Milan, which not by chance won two Champions Leagues and a Scudetto in that period (and its players two Ballon d’Ors). For Inter, on the other hand, it was a rather complicated period, marked by defeats which, however, served to build the foundations for the victories that came in the following years.

The first Milan derby in the Champions League was played in the semifinals of the 2002/2003 edition. Inter came from the famous 5 May 2002, the day in which, on the last day of the championship, they sensationally squandered the opportunity to win the Scudetto again after thirteen years, losing in Rome against Lazio. She had just sold Ronaldo to Real Madrid and was still coached by Argentinean Hector Cúper, but it was at the end of a cycle: the following season a large turnover of players began and Cúper was also sacked.

Milan too had difficult seasons: in 2001 they had finished sixth in the championship and had not won anything since the Scudetto in 1999. His season up to that point had been disappointing, but he was preparing to enter one of the most successful periods in its history . At the beginning of that season, the various Maldini, Inzaghi, Rui Costa, Pirlo, Shevchenko and Gattuso had been joined by the Brazilian goalkeeper Dida, the defender Alessandro Nesta from Lazio and the midfielder Clarence Seedorf, bought from Inter in an exchange with the full-back Francesco Coco who turned out to be successful only for Milan.

With these players, coached by Carlo Ancelotti, Milan then formed one of the most remembered, united and successful teams in the recent history of Italian football. Inter, for its part, was held up by a group formed by the captain Javier Zanetti and then by the Italians Vieri, Materazzi, Toldo and Di Biagio, to which Fabio Cannavaro and the Argentine Hernan Crespo had been added, hired to bolster an attack remained with Vieri, Alvaro Recoba and two reinforcements: Mohamed Kallon and a young Obafemi Martins.

Both teams, although different, worked. Inter finished that championship in second place, Milan in third. In the Champions League they passed the two group stages (Milan both first) and managed to win two complicated matches in the quarter-finals: Milan against Ajax with a daring last-minute goal in the return matchInter holding on in the second leg in Valencia despite a 2-1 defeat.

Inter often relied on defense to the bitter end in the most complicated matches, then trying to take advantage of the isolated opportunities created by the quality of their forwards. Milan also focused a lot on defense, but knew how to control the game and be more offensive. When it came to the derby in the semifinals, however, offensive qualities and approaches gave way to prudence and fears, such as those of the two coaches, at risk of exemption in case of defeat.

AC Milan’s formation in 2003 (Marco Lussoso/LaPresse)

It is said that Inter used to stimulate the team by granting generous match prizes: over 100,000 euros per player to reach the semi-finals, over 200,000 to win the tournament. Berlusconi’s Milan used to facilitate players from their arrival in Milan with the granting of various privileges, but occasionally with match prizes, most of the time provided only in case of final victory.

The matches were played on 7 and 13 May. Milan hosted the first leg at home, i.e. in the Rossoneri version of the San Siro. As Ancelotti implied in those days, and then explained it better in the following years, he prepared the first leg with the intention of not conceding a goal at home in order to try to take advantage of the no longer existing rule of away goals: in the event of tie between home and away the team with the highest number of goals scored away from home was rewarded.

It went exactly like this. Milan, strong in a united and high-level defense (the starters were Costacurta, Nesta, Maldini, Kaladze) managed to keep Inter on 0-0 and to block his attack, left without Vieri and with Crespo who at the beginning of the year had torn a muscle in his leg and only returned to play in April. Ancelotti also remained faithful to his strategy even if at half-time Berlusconi went down to the locker room unhappy with the team’s submissive game: he wanted it more offensive and asked for the Brazilian full-back Serginho to enter the field. «The pressure I experienced in that semifinal I never experienced there again» Ancelotti recalled recently.

The return match was also rather blocked, but with seconds remaining in the first half Shevchenko won a tackle with Cordoba in the box and in a fall managed to score the opening goal. In the second half, Inter changed their entire attack by bringing in Kallon and Martins, with the latter stealing time from Maldini on a sloping ball eight minutes from the end and scoring the equalizer. A few minutes later Kallon had the opportunity to score the goal that could have taken Inter to the final, but his shot slammed into the shin of Abbiati, the Milan reserve goalkeeper who had replaced the injured Dida.

As Adriano Galliani, managing director of Berlusconi’s Milan, has repeatedly recalled, with that decisive save Abbiati “earned a life contract”.

And that match the paths of the two teams split. Milan went to the Champions League final, won it by beating Juventus on penalties and took the momentum to establish themselves permanently at the highest levels of European football, again with Ancelotti as coach. An interlocutory phase began for Inter and also a period of reflection on the part of the Moratti family, which in the face of enormous investments was no longer able to obtain concrete results from the UEFA Cup won in 1998. Many players were criticized very harshly, and among these Recoba — considered Massimo Moratti’s favorite — who paid for two disappointing performances and above all a missed goal in the first leg.

Toldo consoles Cordoba after elimination (Phil Cole/Getty Images)

Two seasons later a derby was drawn again, in the quarter-finals.

Milan had kept the same group of players, which they had strengthened again by acquiring Cafù, Kaka, Stam and Crespo, who returned to Chelsea after his loan to Inter. And in the meantime he had also won a Scudetto. Inter, on the other hand, had changed three coaches before hiring Roberto Mancini, and with him starting a new cycle marked in particular by the signings of Esteban Cambiasso and Julio Cesar, and before that Dejan Stankovic and Adriano, bought back from Parma.

But precisely, it was still a team under construction, and the derby happened at the worst possible moment. Unlike two years earlier there was a clear favorite, Milan, who proved it by winning 2-0 the first leg at home with goals from Stam and Shevchenko, both with headers. In the return, Shevchenko again gave Milan the lead in the half hour with a shot from outside the area. Inter tried to react but found great difficulty until, twenty minutes from the end, the goal of a possible 1-1 draw was annulled.

At that point, between the frustration of the disallowed goal and the prospect of losing another “Euroderby” against rivals Milan, the Inter curve began to throw objects and smoke bombs onto the pitch with the intention of interrupting the match and a way to refuse defeat. A smoke grenade hit Dida between the head and shoulder and more were thrown onto the pitch until the referee sent the teams to the locker room declaring the match definitively concluded.

Milan were given the 3-0 forfeit victory, who then progressed through with a 5-0 aggregate and then went on to the final, but lost it in the famous match in Istanbul against Liverpool. But then he made up for it in 2007, finding and beating Liverpool in the final in Athens. There was also talk of a one-year exclusion from the European cups for Inter, but in the end it was punished by UEFA with four games to be played without an audience in the following season and a fine of around 300 thousand euros.

– Read also: When Inter did it big