If he had not succeeded in becoming a football player, Federico Dimarco would have watched the semi-final of Inter with AC Milan from the stable of organized Nerazzurri fans. The next morning, he went with his father Gianni to the Porta Romana area of ​​Milan to open the family grocery store. If…

He first took the field in a game like the one he won on Wednesday night. Dimarco was six years old when he was at the San Siro to watch the big derby against AC Milan in the Champions League semi-final. “As an Inter fan, I don’t have the best memories,” he said of that 2003 match, when the Rossoneri reached the final and even won the trophy.

But life plays strange games. Remembering that night, Dimarco entered the field of the same stadium against the same great rival less than 24 hours ago, now an Inter player, deciding that this time the outcome of history would be different.

“It’s an incredible feeling to think that I was here 20 years ago to watch the semi-finals and now I’m playing in one of them,” he will say on the eve of the match, almost sobbing, with his coach Simone Inzaghi. next to him, who in turn stressed: “This is not a derby. It’s a derby.”

When the national anthem was played, Dimarco found himself face to face with some 7,000 Inter fans. He remembered last year’s Coppa Italia victories, and then the Super Cup, when he picked up a megaphone and became one with them. He remembered the days when he too was in the same booth. A few minutes later, he passed to Henrik Mikitarian 2-0, making five passes in the tournament, the same number as Vinicius, and the great Messi was left with four.

A few years earlier, in 2006, Inter became the first Serie A team to not have a single Italian player on its roster. But with Indazgi, the team’s identity took on an Italian character again. Against Milan, there were five Italians in the starting lineup. Alessandro Bastoni, Francesco Acerbi, Matteo Darmian, Nicolo Barella and, of course, Dimarco.

All of them, to one degree or another, perfectly understand what this match means for the two teams, whether reaching the Champions League final will be decided or not. Darmian, for example, was an Inter fan but started out at the Milan academy, who at one point admitted that when he was on trial at Milan in 2000, the youth coaches asked all the kids to name their favorite players. and he said Clarence Seedorf, who was then playing for Inter.

Acerbi, on the other hand, came to Milan when he was 24 years old from Chievo and was advertised as the new Nesta and the team even gave him the number 13 shirt. But then he fell short of expectations. “I didn’t think like a pro,” he admitted. “I often went to training drunk, not sober since last night. Physically, I was fine because I was always strong. All I needed was a few hours of sleep and I could still play on the field.” The testicular cancer that knocked twice on his door changed his outlook. That the Milanese had two for him finally came true at Lazio, from whom he left on loan to Inter on the last transfer day.

As for Dimarco, from the moment he… came of age in football, he was more away from Milan than in it. After being loaned out to Ascoli and Empoli, then – for financial fair play reasons – he was sold for €3.5m to Swiss side Sion with Inter placing a buyout clause of €7m which he immediately paid. to bring the player back in 2018. He went on loan to Parma and Verona before returning to Inter in June 2021.

These are the players Inzaghi turned to when things went wrong this year. Inter have lost 11 league matches, the most in 12 years, and despite reaching the Coppa Italia final and one step away from the Champions League, the Italian coach has been on the doorstep several times. exit. The solution was to trust five players who know what it means to play for Inter and at the same time know what it takes to get the job done in Serie A.

Wednesday’s win was Inter’s sixth in a row in all competitions, with Inzaghi proving himself a knockout specialist. He achieved something similar as Lazio manager when he eliminated Roma in the Coppa Italia semi-finals in 2017 and Milan last year.

When the Inter fans left the San Siro around midnight, they lit more flares and sang one of their favorite songs, which refers to a “hated” opponent. A song that even Dimarco knows by heart…