Inter, the numbers of the crisis: goals are missing and shots are wasted

Inter’s shots have no effect, the opponents’ missed crosses (how many whistles Candreva got at San Siro when he didn’t get the cross right…) yes. The Nerazzurri’s moment is all here. And the moral seems clear: either you create your own luck or… Simone Inzaghi’s team, on the other hand, at the moment only seems to know how to throw itself away. And the goal found from play five games after the last time was not enough: even at Arechi with Salernitana, despite the serenity of an immediate advantage with Gosens who should have cleared his mind and loosened his legs, Inter fired hello. There were 25 shots attempted by the Nerazzurri, a useless amount as already in the last three league defeats against Spezia, Juventus and Fiorentina: in total, in the four matches considered, there were 87 shots. They led to only one goal from open play, that of Gosens in Salerno. Two in total, counting Lukaku’s penalty in La Spezia.

The numbers

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To make an even worse effect, from a Nerazzurri perspective, is the data on shots on goal: even 11 against Salernitana, 25 in total considering the four games. Nothing to do: Inter fails to capitalize. He hits the crossbar when the ball is only to be pushed into the goal, he slams into the opposing goalkeeper (Ochoa is extraordinary like Dragowski in the Spezia-Inter match, but if the opposing goalkeeper always gets excited, there is obviously also Nerazzurri complicity) and makes a mistake: all ‘Arechi eight shots out, in Liguria there were even 13 for a total of 35 in the four games.

From bad to worse

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The data on wrong conclusions is only one of many alarm bells. Also considering the cups (the draws against Porto and Juventus are results which, it must be said, remain positive) Inter have not found victory in the last six games played: the last success remains the one against Lecce on 5 March, the only match brought home in the last six Serie A matches. The away performance, then, is nightmarish: only two points between Sampdoria, Bologna, Spezia and Salernitana; five league wins from 15 matches; tenth place in the standings considering only away games. Inter have won away only once in 2023, in Cremona in a comeback. Now he will return to Portugal for the Champions League without the serenity, as happened in Porto, of the positive result of the first leg. The Lisbon match against Benfica will be a crash tests. And with these numbers, finding trust is tricky.