The Frenchman returns to scoring and also provides two assists for the Argentine, who returns after the stop and scores immediately: “With teammates like that I get goosebumps”
Exactly one minute, sixty split seconds: the San Siro stopwatch tells you that it wasn’t just a goal, but a message. A praise to the value of punctuality, sacred even in the frenzy of modern football. Inter without Lautaro were white with fear, Inter with Lautaro enjoys excellent health, is bold and courageous: the Argentine, upon his return after 45 days of sulking and calf treatment, made a point of being punctual, very punctual, in reminding the championship that the music has changed. He wanted the second hands to make a full revolution, just one, to score one of the most important goals of the season.
here they are again, THURAM AND lAUTARO
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The ball, however, didn’t arrive there by chance, it wasn’t just any teammate who ferried it, but the twin of recent years: Thuram, a completely different player compared to the one seen in the last month, immediately set the table for the captain’s banquet upon his return. It was then repeated, to underline the concept: he served the ball to Toro to make it 3-1 at the start of the second half, when Roma suddenly ended up in the ring, before going on his own and scoring too, with a header from a corner. An Argentine brace, a pair of assists plus a French goal: that monstrous creature called ThuLa has re-emerged from the waters. The two hadn’t played together since the start of Inter-Juve on 14 February, the one in the Bastoni case before the big slowdown between the Champions League and Serie A. Now that the two halves of the apple have come together again, it’s a completely different Inter. They both repeated it at the end of the match, making sweet eyes at each other in front of the cameras. “It was a direct clash, a very important match for the championship and for the signal we had to give to ourselves. We talked in the last few hours, we had to go onto the pitch with the right personality and attitude”, said the captain before slipping into the words a bit: “Marcus is back, that is, he’s not back… He made the difference as he always does for us. There’s a drop, I always have it too. We accept the criticism but we always give our best for Inter”. “I missed Lautaro, but the same goes for Pio and Bonny who are very important. But it’s true that I have a particular bond with Lauti, the whole team does: he’s our captain, our key player, he continues to set an example for us. This goal of mine wasn’t a click, but it just gives me more confidence to continue.”
ON TARGET
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No one should be surprised, the Argentine is the one in charge of the pair. Indeed, Lautaro is the particle accelerator for the whole of Inter: the entire company, starting with Marcus himself, has been awakened in their senses by the return of the captain, who not only has the cannibalistic hunger of the center forward (16 goals in the championship, top scorer in one of those solitary escapes like Pogacar which annihilate the rivals in the running), but is the Nerazzurri’s flag and example. When he is there, with the band rolled up on his arm, Inter no longer trembles, in fact the unconscious fear of not reaching the finish line disappears completely. It’s no coincidence that at the end of the match the Argentine also wanted to talk about his injured Azzurri teammates, one above all: “When we talk about Bastoni and the others, I get goosebumps. They leave their soul on the pitch, even when you lose. They were left out of the World Cup but they come back, they work with their heads held high and give their all. Anyone can suffer the decline, but we’ve been taking Inter to the top for years.” Yesterday, while Toro definitively separated Bonimba among the goalscorers in Inter’s history – 173 against 171 goals -, Marcus also showed signs of Easter resurrection: in the last month he had given the worst version of himself, sometimes even in training but, just when the definitive overtaking of Pio seemed close, Lilian’s son pushed the young man away from behind. It will come, but it’s not Esposito’s time yet. After tasting the sweet taste of a goal for the national team again, albeit in a friendly against Colombia, Thuram felt the same old sensation in an Inter shirt: the goal was missing from the outing in Sassuolo on 8 February. Inter doesn’t live on ThuLa alone, but having the two arrows united as they once did helps to hit the target: after this massacre against the Giallorossi, it suddenly seems very close again.
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