Simone Inzaghi

I am amused by your attempt to paint our path to CL lucky.

Just bacause it was two Portuguese sides and Milan? How about getting past the group with Bayern and Barcelona?
And as much you want to downplay this, playing a derby semifinal is something that's incredibly hard, let alone win twice. Milan KOd Napoli who was doing what we're doing to Serie A now...

City beat Gladbach, Dortmund and PSG to reach the final in 2021...
How's that tougher? At least Benfica and Porto have European pedigree and compete for a title. And PSG, sure, stacked team, but fragile mentally.

PSGs run to the final was Dortmung and then single games against Atalanta and Leipzig... wasn't that "lucky"?

Liverpool beat Porto, City (who were still choking at all QFs) and Roma to reach the final. How was that tougher?

Real Madrid in 2016, had Roma, Wolfsburg and Pellegrini's City which wasn't anything special. Barely beat these guys. Then barely beat Atletico in PKs. Undeserved and lucky?
Atletico had beaten PSV, Barcelona (holders) and Bayern (possibly the favorites) to reach that final..

Real Madrid only played German teams to reach the final in 2014.

Dortmund had to beat Shakhtar and Malaga to get to play Real in the semis and reach the final. Lucky?

Manchester United in 2011 had to beat Marseille, Chelsea (Anelka was their best player ffs) and Schalke to reach the final. Was that lucky?


Can you stop this nonsense? This is why you're carrying that "pick on me" target card on your back. And you're doing it repeatedly and purposely!

It's been talked to death, but as I said, pretty much every club you would want to avoid drew on the other side. The biggest teams on our side were Napoli or Tottenham.

Pretty basic my brah. It is objectively one of the most skewed CL distributions in recent memory. There are others too, and you can only beat the team in front of you but it's like flipping heads ten times in a row.


21-22, the scary teams were fairly equally distributed - one half had {Bayern, Liverpool, us}, the other half had {City, Atletico, Chelsea, Real, PSG}

20-21 {Bayern, PSG, Barca, City, Dortmund}, {Real, Liverpool, Atletico, Chelsea}

19-20 {Tottenham, Atletico, Liverpool, PSG, Dortmund} {Real, City, Barca, Chelsea, Bayern}

18-19 {Tottenham, Dortmund, City, Real, Atletico, Juve} {PSG, Barca, Liverpool, Bayern}

If you cant see how Milan, Tottenham, Napoli, Frankfurt, Brugge, Benfica, Porto isnt like the other 4 then theres just no point evren continuing the discussion.

.h. said:

It's been talked to death, but as I said, pretty much every club you would want to avoid drew on the other side. The biggest teams on our side were Napoli or Tottenham.

Pretty basic my brah.

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We didn't want to avoid Chelsea.

Tottenham wasn't on any side, they were knocked out by Milan before "sides of draw" were drawn.

Milan and Napoli weren't favorable draws for us in the QFs either, we only hit our form around that time anyway.

So say we go past Atletico and then we end up in a position to play one of PSV/Dortmund, Porto/Arsenal and Barcelona/Napoli.. you'd call that lucky because we avoid Real, Bayern, City and PSG?

I wonder, was any of those teams lucky to face us last season as well?

brehme1989 said:

We didn't want to avoid Chelsea.

Tottenham wasn't on any side, they were knocked out by Milan before "sides of draw" were drawn.

Milan and Napoli weren't favorable draws for us in the QFs either, we only hit our form around that time anyway.

So say we go past Atletico and then we end up in a position to play one of PSV/Dortmund, Porto/Arsenal and Barcelona/Napoli.. you'd call that lucky because we avoid Real, Bayern, City and PSG?

I wonder, was any of those teams lucky to face us last season as well?

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see my post.

brehme1989 said:

So say we go past Atletico and then we end up in a position to play one of PSV/Dortmund, Porto/Arsenal and Barcelona/Napoli.. you'd call that lucky because we avoid Real, Bayern, City and PSG?

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if thats our run to the final, then yes, lady luck has smiled on us again! Objectively. (dont get me wrong atletivco is a fairly tough tie)

.h. said:

see my post.

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Ok so last CL final appearance was a fluke because the good teams failed in the groups and got bad Last 16 draws that eliminated competition and the CL was just weak.

Gotcha.

We were lucky in the draw. We did well, and beat some good teams, to get to the final, but that is prima facie a lopsided CL draw.

I'd love to have a statistic - and I've tried to see if I can pull it together, but I cant - which is something like 'number of pre-tournament top 5/8/10 seeded clubs by gambling odds per final journey'. I bet that metric would have our last season at the most lop sided in the last few seasons. Because realistically, in 22-23, MAYBE one or two clubs on our side were top 10 seeds? If that? I'd be surprised if Milan or Napoli were top 10 going into the tournament. Tottenham MAY have been but I'm not convinced. On the other side, you probably had at least 5 of the 8 clubs being top 10 pre-tournaments?


I swear round here sometimes I feel like one of the few people who are actually attached to reality. I mean how can you look at a half that has those 8 clubs and say eh, no big deal, its just the same as the last 5 years in the CL

It isnt. It's factually not. It's fine, Inzaghi beat the teams in front of him and got us to the CL final, but can we just be honest with ourselves and admit that was an easier run? We're all glad we didnt run into City or Real or someone in the knock out stages.

.h. said:

We were lucky in the draw. We did well, and beat some good teams, to get to the final, but that is prima facie a lopsided CL draw.

I'd love to have a statistic - and I've tried to see if I can pull it together, but I cant - which is something like 'number of pre-tournament top 5/8/10 seeded clubs by gambling odds per final journey'. I bet that metric would have our last season at the most lop sided in the last few seasons. Because realistically, in 22-23, MAYBE one or two clubs on our side were top 10 seeds? If that? I'd be surprised if Milan or Napoli were top 10 going into the tournament. Tottenham MAY have been but I'm not convinced. On the other side, you probably had at least 5 of the 8 clubs being top 10 pre-tournaments?

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Good luck with your research.

.h. said:

I swear round here sometimes I feel like one of the few people who are actually attached to reality. I mean how can you look at a half that has those 8 clubs and say eh, no big deal, its just the same as the last 5 years in the CL

It isnt. It's factually not. It's fine, Inzaghi beat the teams in front of him and got us to the CL final, but can we just be honest with ourselves and admit that was an easier run? We're all glad we didnt run into City or Real or someone in the knock out stages.

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Again, you're claiming to be some data guy yet you're using it wrong constantly. Just because you like numbers doesn't mean you get what they're saying.

Now tell me, what's our 8 team group in this draw? What? It's not done yet? How can I claim that we'll have an easy path or not before the case then???
Team that expected to qualify failed and it's suddenly our fault for being in an "easy path"?

We ended the group second and got a bad draw now. Last year we got the winner of a tough group that you just didn't like so we were lucky. What if we drew Atletico last season as well? Would that make it less of a lucky path for you? They bottomed their group, Porto won it. Leverkusen who are now cruising in the Bundesliga ended up 3rd so Club Brugge got 2nd. So what?

Benfica topped their group vs PSG and Juventus. Were they bad?

Milan was the only 2nd placed team we faced, and it's a derby I remind you, and they beat two 1st seeders in Tottenham and Napoli to reach that.

Again, all these mental gymnastics you want to go through just because you're fixated on being "right" in some alternative scenario that no one else considers or imagines is nauseating.

No one says it couldn't have been harder to reach the final. But claiming it's lucky and that this was the only way we'd reach it is nonsensical and you should put a rest to it. We've been hearing about it for 10 months now and it's just a false statement.


Now continue with your research and let us also know if there was a team that reached the final without facing at least two teams that topped their groups instead of looking at what bookies had on their minds 6 months before the knockouts...

brehme1989 said:

Now tell me, what's our 8 team group in this draw? What? It's not done yet? How can I claim that we'll have an easy path or not before the case then???

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Most of this there's no point really replying to, but this argument is really stupid. And you know it.
Your argument is kinda like saying - well it's not lucky unless you were planning to flip 5 heads in a row.

It was a lucky draw. Just because it wasn't fully decided before the r16 games were played doesn't mean it's not a lucky draw. We got a perfectly reasonably r16 draw, and then the QF and SF draw was lucky. In your own argument things could have been very different and then the draw wouldn't have been lucky.


Anyway, even based on actual league performances, Napoli were the only team in our half to be worried about. The argument works however you cut it, the bookies pre tournament one would just be a bit easier to do, the data is out there I just can't be fucked finding it right now.

There's not a single new argument (from either of us) in this series of postings so I'm just gonna leave it there. People can decide for themselves based on this post https://forzainterforums.com/index.php?threads/simone-inzaghi.15496/post-2246541 how they feel.


The only person who is fixated on being "right" here is you. I even said there was no point rehashing this discussion but the world's most stubborn boomer decided to start it up again.

You know what. I found the data. Once I've done bath time for my daughter I'll post the stats and you can decide for yourselves

.h. said:

Most of this there's no point really replying to, but this argument is really stupid. And you know it.
Your argument is kinda like saying - well it's not lucky unless you were planning to flip 5 heads in a row.

It was a lucky draw. Just because it wasn't fully decided before the r16 games were played doesn't mean it's not a lucky draw. We got a perfectly reasonably r16 draw, and then the QF and SF draw was lucky. In your own argument things could have been very different and then the draw wouldn't have been lucky.


Anyway, even based on actual league performances, Napoli were the only team in our half to be worried about. The argument works however you cut it, the bookies pre tournament one would just be a bit easier to do, the data is out there I just can't be fucked finding it right now.

There's not a single new argument (from either of us) in this series of postings so I'm just gonna leave it there. People can decide for themselves based on this post https://forzainterforums.com/index.php?threads/simone-inzaghi.15496/post-2246541 how they feel.


The only person who is fixated on being "right" here is you. I even said there was no point rehashing this discussion but the world's most stubborn boomer decided to start it up again.

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Okay, so you don't want to admit that the easiest knockout path ever was Liverpool in 2021, which I omitted on purpose earlier hoping you'd at least be respectful enough to mention, but it was Inter who beat a team that was favored by bookies over us since group stage (your lovely argument) and we beat two sides that topped their group, plus a derby semifinal.

So playing vs Inter that hadn't reach last 16 in 10 years (and needing luck to win away and the refs to stop Inter momentum after the goal btw) then Benfica (because Barcelona choked, actually it was Benfica against them, should have beaten them home and away) and then Villarreal who got 2nd (only beat Atalanta and Young Boys in the group) was all good because that same Villarreal side knocked out Juventus and Bayern for them?

brehme1989 said:

Okay, so you don't want to admit that the easiest knockout path ever was Liverpool in 2021, which I omitted on purpose earlier hoping you'd at least be respectful enough to mention, but it was Inter who beat a team that was favored by bookies over us since group stage (your lovely argument) and we beat two sides that topped their group, plus a derby semifinal.

So playing vs Inter that hadn't reach last 16 in 10 years (and needing luck to win away and the refs to stop Inter momentum after the goal btw) then Benfica (because Barcelona choked, actually it was Benfica against them, should have beaten them home and away) and then Villarreal who got 2nd (only beat Atalanta and Young Boys in the group) was all good because that same Villarreal side knocked out Juventus and Bayern for them?

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Tbh I didn't look at the details. In their half though they still had Bayern and Inter.

I'll post my analysis in a bit once my daughter is put down. But yes, that's a fairly easy run. The key point though is they had at least 2 of the tournament likelys on their side. I think last year we had maybe 1 possibly none.

okay this was a bit of a pain in the ass to pull together, but I found some sites which had the historic odds.

Spoilers - ignore this, I'm just storing data here if you wanna see the raw info


So, just to define it, skew is going to be {number of top 10 pre-tournament in one half of the draw}/{total remaining at R16}. That means skew will always add up to 100%, there's a hypothetical case where none of the top 10 make it but thats not a practical concern.


The 18-19 knock outs had {5}/{10} so a perfect 50/50 split


19-20 was {4}/{10} so 40%

20-21 was {4}/{10} so 40%

21-22 was {3}/{9} so 33%

time for the magic one... I think I know what the answer will be but lets work it out together!

22-23 was {1}/{7} so 14%.


Of the 5 years I checked, the most skewed R16. I'm sure its not unique, but its a once every 5/10 years event

I wouldn't say these are the best players we ever had (I know nobody is saying that), but I will say this is the best and most functional football we ever played. This Inter IS consistency.

Now if we had prime 2010 Eto'o, Milito, Balotelli and Pandev instead of our current group of attackers (sorry Lautaro and Thuram), then yes, greatest Inter ever, no doubt.

That depth in attack and at least one really clutch player (we had two in 2009-2011) is missing from us being totally unstoppable. Now we are just mostly unstoppable

wera said:

I wouldn't say these are the best players we ever had (I know nobody is saying that), but I will say this is the best and most functional football we ever played. This Inter IS consistency.

Now if we had prime 2010 Eto'o, Milito, Balotelli and Pandev instead of our current group of attackers (sorry Lautaro and Thuram), then yes, greatest Inter ever, no doubt.

That depth in attack and at least one really clutch player (we had two in 2009-2011) is missing from us being totally unstoppable. Now we are just mostly unstoppable

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That's the thing - the *team* combined is brilliant. Yeah, we can sit here and say we've got a bunch of mediocre players in various positions, but actually, as a whole unit this inter is next level imho

We'll see at the latter stages of the CL if individual quality is missing/comes up short, but right now, given what ingredients he has, Inzaghi has done something amazing

brehme1989 said:

Ok so last CL final appearance was a fluke because the good teams failed in the groups and got bad Last 16 draws that eliminated competition and the CL was just weak.

Gotcha.

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Last night was Brawha against Bubba, now is your turn. Someone already anticipated that last night.

Overall, I tend to be on your side of the argument.
In over 50% of the cases, if you look at the winner or even the challenger of the final, you can see an "easy" path. That happen more often than not and a team can play only the opponent who is designated. Every year, many from the autumn favourites stumble over "unexpected situations" like bad luck, injuries, lack of form and so on.

I am proud that we reach the CL final and I don`t give a shit that we beat those 2 portuguese teams. They were there because they deserved it.

But Brehme, you need to admit there is a difference between the path we have that year and that in 2010. And this has nothing to do with winning the CL.
In 2010 in our way of winning CL we beat the champions from the EPL, Primera and Bundesliga. The best team from the best league. And we were not lucky in any of rounds. We beat them because we were the better team. We were the daddy and proved it.
Put it simple, I cannot say the same about last year.

andrei said:

But Brehme, you need to admit there is a difference between the path we have that year and that in 2010. And this has nothing to do with winning the CL.

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Never claimed this. Not sure on how it's relevance either.

andrei said:

In 2010 in our way of winning CL we beat the champions from the EPL, Primera and Bundesliga. The best team from the best league. And we were not lucky in any of rounds. We beat them because we were the better team. We were the daddy and proved it.
Put it simple, I cannot say the same about last year.

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This is a different subject to "we were lucky to make CL final because we only played against shit teams". Which is untrue.


Some people just fall for the marketing gimmicks in this sport and think whatever the anglo media has them to believe.

brehme1989 said:

This is a different subject to "we were lucky to make CL final because we only played against shit teams". Which is untrue.

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I would say that there is no team in the CL that coincidentally got to the knock out phase. They are there for a reason, because they played good. Also the final vs City we showed that we were the best team in the entire CL run even though we were so unlucky. Even Pep said that his hardest match to play that season was versus Inter.

.h. said:

Well, we say they all played good, we also beat Milan like 5 times last calendar year. I just cant believe anyone cant even *fathom* the possibility that if we'd drawn, for arguments sake, Real, City, Liverpool, Bayern, that the outcome may have been a bit different?

And, yeah, I'd be the first to say that was a shitty shitty draw.

Whereas (pretty much, aside from CSKA) that's basically the equivalent of the draw Inter 2010 had.

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That's one thing but you're taking it to the extreme saying that "we caught a lucky break".

Sure City had to beat Bayern and Real Madrid but so what? They were both quite poor at the time. Just because the name sounds fancy doesn't make it worse.

Atletico is one of the worst teams we could have drawn and here we are.
I'd much rather face Bayern, Barcelona, Arsenal or Dortmund than them in this R16 but because you put emphasis on the wrong thing you're creating a narrative that they're not a harder matchup.

and yet again people arent even bothering to read my posts

just a few posts ago I said Atletico is one of the worst draws we could have had.


And, yes, we did catch a lucky break. Let me direct you to my 'skew' post above. Its the most skewed CL of the 5 seasons I analysed. I bet if I went further back, as well, it'd also be one of the most skewed probably for a decade. We got a - being slightly flippant as I havent done the actual calculations - one in a decade draw. It's fine. This happens, and we dont know what would have happened if we had faced bigger teams. But we should also appreciate our path to the final had fewer of the perceived 'big teams' than any other CL in the last 5 years. Even your Liverpool example, IMHO, is a harder draw than ours, and that 'stat' is backed up by my skewness measure post.


Anyway,t his thread is sufficiently off topic, and the arguments are all re-hashed for almost a season now, without any original thoughts or new perspectives aside from me actually adding some data that proves my point. You're welcome to agree, or disagree, makes no difference to me. Back to the original point - 'no whinging if we get knocked out by atletico' is a bit ridiculous.

peace, have a good sunday evening!