Istanbul will have its flagbearer, a Turkish international, to grace its Champions League showpiece.
Armenia’s greatest footballer will be there, too, treading through difficult geopolitical territory but at the European final he feels owed, four years after his nationality prevented him from taking part in one.
The younger of the Inzaghi brothers has his chance to emulate a celebrated sibling. Italian football gets its opportunity to put a shade of blue on a showpiece event, some compensation for the Azzurri, the national team, having failed to make last year’s World Cup.
Internazionale's arrival in next month’s European Cup final, after their emphatic 3-0 aggregate victory over city rivals AC Milan, brings with it a long carriage of individual landmarks and redemption tales. Above all, theirs is a stirring outsider journey for a club that last experienced such heights back in 2010.
Back then, Simone Inzaghi was hanging up his boots, saying farewell to a fine centre-forward’s career that was always a little under the shadow of his brother Pippo, a European club champion with Milan, with 57 Italy caps to Simone’s three.
Both went into coaching, where junior’s achievements have greatly outshone Inzaghi senior’s.
At Istanbul’s Ataturk Olympic stadium in 23 days time, the younger Inzaghi, 47, now aspires to match Jose Mourinho’s standout success as Inter manager, the lifting of a European Cup, and to take up full membership of the VIP class of Italian coaches.
He had taken Inter to a place, club football’s most prestigious final, where Roberto Mancini, Antonio Conte and, before them, Marcello Lippi could not.
Inter 1 AC Milan 0: player ratings
Inzaghi’s qualities of careful organisation and shrewd selection shone through Inter’s commanding of Milan over 180 minutes at a seething San Siro, where victories in both legs brought to four the number of derbies Inter have won against their neighbours in this calendar year alone.
Inzaghi does not have quite the calibre of squad Mourinho took to a Treble 13 years ago, and his Inter still need points to confirm a top-four finish in the league, but he has paced the campaign to peak at the right time.
Only last month, after picking up just one point in four league games, Inzaghi’s position seemed in peril. Tuesday’s second leg win over Milan, thanks to a Lautaro Martinez goal, was Inter’s eighth victory in succession.
Inzaghi gave his players Wednesday off, to relax and watch Manchester City versus Real Madrid in the evening, the first close study of many that will be applied to their final opponents.
“They have not rested since April 1,” Inzaghi said of his players, praising their “running, aggression, focus and determination. We have made an unbelievable effort".
The energy comes from a relatively old group, with Edin Dzeko, 37, a figurehead, scorer of the early, first-leg goal that set the tone for Inter’s efficient mastery of Milan.
The evergreen Bosnian, formerly of City, Roma and Wolfsburg, is on the way to his first Champions League final, his savvy and his importance for set-piece routines likely to edge him into the starting line-up ahead of Romelu Lukaku, whose season-long loan back to Inter, who he left for Chelsea in 2021, could yet finish with a European Cup gold medal.
Hakan Calhanoglu, formerly of Milan and Inter’s best expert in delivering those set-pieces, has been vital. He scored the only goal of the decisive autumn win over Barcelona that effectively put Inter through to the knockouts from a tough group that also included Bayern Munich.
Calhanoglu can anticipate a warm welcome from Turks on June 10th. He will be only the fifth Turkey international to appear in a Champions League final, the first in one staged there.
Henrikh Mkhitaryan, his fellow midfielder, may not feel quite the same affection given the frayed diplomatic relationship between Turkey and Mkhitarayan’s native Armenia.
But his passport will not be deemed so problematic as it was when Mhkitarayan, 34, did not travel to the 2019 Europa League final with his then Arsenal teammates. He stayed away because of conflict between Armenia and Azerbaijan, where that final was hosted.
Mkhitarayan has earned this final, netting the second goal of the first leg against Milan, set up by Federico Dimarco, an attacking full-back who has made huge strides in his development under Inzaghi.
No one, going into this week’s second legs, had supplied more assists in the Champions League than Dimarco, for whom a lifelong ambition has been realised.
He grew up as an Inter supporter and recalls watching as a five-year-old as Inter lost a Champions League semi-final to Milan in 2003.
“It’s a dream come true, shared by all of us,” said Inzaghi. “We have grown together, always believing we could make it even when nobody gave us much of a chance.”
