How rookie Cristian Chivu rode the storm to outfox coaching giants and seal Serie A title for 'reborn' Inter Milan

Inter’s unrivalled wage budget, two-time UEFA Champions League finalist squad and trophy-winning pedigree could have made them the runaway Serie A title favourites at the season’s start. But for many, there was one caveat: Chivu.

The Romanian rookie had been propelled into a huge job too fast, the logic went. After all, he was named Simone Inzaghi’s successor with just three months of senior coaching experience on his CV from guiding Parma to safety last term.

The former Inter defender and Under-19 coach took over an ageing squad that was on its knees after a 5-0 drubbing by Paris Saint-Germain in the Champions League final and surrendering the Scudetto to Napoli. When Inzaghi walked, all the talk was of a cycle being over. The end of an era.  

Replacing Inzaghi, the architect of Inter’s 20th Serie A crown and two runs to the Champions League final in three years, seemed like it could be a poisoned chalice, especially for a minnow tossed into the managerial shark pool of Serie A.

Everywhere Chivu looked, sharp-teethed coaching behemoths lurked. Massimiliano Allegri across town at AC Milan. Antonio Conte down in Naples. Maurizio Sarri and Gian Piero Gasperini in the capital. Then, later in the season, Luciano Spalletti at Juventus.  

Between them, that quintet has claimed 27 major honours, including 13 Serie A titles - Inzaghi and Stefano Pioli are the only other coaches to have won the Scudetto in the last 16 years.

But after beating Parma on Sunday night, this 45-year-old 'David' from Romania was left standing above those scattered Goliaths in triumph, after wrapping up the title with three games to spare.

”When I arrived, the narrative depicted was that this team was at the end of an era," Chivu said last week. "But they were reborn and found the motivation to be what they always had been."

Reborn indeed. And remarkably, things could get better still before his memorable debut season ends.

The bookies, much of the media – – and even Chivu himself had Napoli down as title favourites when the season kicked off.

”With the team they have and how much they have spent, I would say Napoli are the favourites,” Chivu said ahead of Inter’s opener against Torino.

Lowering expectations didn’t seem to help when he got off to a stuttering start, though.

A barrage of criticism went Chivu’s way after a 4-3 defeat to rivals Juventus in September left the Nerazzurri with just three points from their opening three games – their worst return for 15 years.

But Chivu kept calm and continued his work. He didn’t rip up Inzaghi’s formula but instead made tweaks, keeping the familiar 3-5-2 system in place but installing a more direct and aggressive approach.

The results soon came, Inter responding to the Juve defeat with a seven-match winning run in all competitions. When they soared to the summit of the table in mid-December, they didn’t look back. Chivu’s side have stayed there ever since.

The league’s top scorers by a distance, Chivu’s all-guns-blazing style has yielded 82 goals, 23 more than next-highest scorers Como, with the coach’s effective rotation between league top scorer Lautaro Martinez, Marcus Thuram, Francesco Pio Esposito and Ange-Yoan Bonny helping his side outperform their xG by an enormous 15 goals, according to Opta data.

Inter have proven a threat from anywhere, with league-high goal numbers from set pieces (20) and from substitutes (13) ensuring opponents could never switch off, while wing-back Federico Dimarco has been on fire, breaking the Serie A assist record with 18 to his name and counting.

”The days when the best defence always won the title are long gone…football is different now, more dynamic, it’s about how you press, the intensity, accepting duels and knowing you might leave gaps uncovered,” Chivu said recently.

”We all saw Bayern Munich 4-3 Real Madrid. Football is taking a different form, where everything moves quicker, and we must adapt.”

Laudable as that approach is, it hasn’t always worked. Inter’s Champions League exit at the hands of Bodo/Glimt led to the Gazzetta dello Sport headline ‘Chivu, zero alibis’ following an embarrassing 5-2 aggregate exit, while Inter’s record in big games has been a constant stick to beat them with.

In their six matches against the other teams in the top four – Napoli, Milan and Juventus – Inter have picked up just four points from a possible 18.

That included two Derby della Madonnina defeats, the second of which in March led to them almost blowing their lead from a 10-point advantage and Fabio Capello describing Chivu as ”confused,” only for Inter to soon restore the gap again.

Yet in an imperfect season, Inter have had the fewest flaws and the highest ceiling of anyone in Italy by a distance and their crowning moment at San Siro against Parma had felt inevitable for some time.

But Chivu won’t be putting his feet up on the beach with a cocktail quite yet.

Next Wednesday, Inter head to the capital to face Lazio in the Coppa Italia final looking to seal the domestic double a year after finishing the season empty-handed.

Should he do so, Chivu will become the first Inter coach since Jose Mourinho in the legendary Treble season of 2009/10 to achieve the feat.

Not bad for a Romanian rookie who got off to a stumbling start.

”Winning is never easy, and it is also down to Chivu,” his predecessor Inzaghi told Gazzetta dello Sport this week.

”Cristian was the right choice, and I knew that because I had seen him work.”

After a tumultuous but ultimately triumphant first year in post, few would now disagree.

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