😱 Spits, gestures & RECORD: when Inter-Napoli was HISTORIC 📊 | OneFootball

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Napoli-Inter this year can be worth the Scudetto: an unusual but not unprecedented scenario: it has happened several times in the history of Serie A.

The challenges at the top between these two teams have often occurred in the first part of the season: like in November 2015 (Juventus won), in October 2017 (Juventus were champions again) or in October 1989 (and that time Napoli triumphed at the end of the season).

But there is a match that literally won the Scudetto: Inter-Napoli, May 28, 1989. Let's see why that match has remained in the memory of Italian football.

A "Pazza Inter" scenario

Inter have a 7-point lead, Napoli, with Maradona, Careca, and Alemao, are chasing in the standings, and the Nerazzurri fans have images in their minds that do not evoke much sympathy: just 4 days earlier, Milan won the European Cup against Barcelona.

Civic redemption must take place that day, but Napoli's class complicates everything: Careca scores the 1-0 with a great shot at the intersection. The "Pazza Inter" does not yet exist in the collective imagination, but the fact that a team with Zenga, Brehme, Bergomi, Matthaus, and Aldo Serena falls apart immediately is unacceptable. Trapattoni on the bench also serves this purpose.

The umbrella gesture and Inter's record

With some tactical changes, Inter play well in the second half, and Nicola Berti scores: a shot deflected by Fusi and a ball that clears the goalkeeper. San Siro wakes up, and Berti himself recounts the atmosphere: "There was crazy adrenaline".

5 minutes from the end, coincidences and talent align: a free kick from the limit must be cleared three times, and on the third, Lothar Matthaus scores the 2-1 goal. Right after this moment, Nicola Berti vents: "I start running and making the umbrella gesture to everyone".

Maradona had already been marked for a few minutes, and the tension gives both teams a lot of freedom: "I marked him, insulted him, and he spat at me too". Things that happened on the field, very 80s-style, without TV evidence, and that ended immediately after the match: "It was a hard-won Scudetto, but Inter deserved it", Maradona says to Nerazzurri president Pellegrini.

The Nerazzurri win the Scudetto after 9 years, with 4 rounds to spare, and at the end of the season, they will have 58 points: an all-time record for Serie A with 20 teams in the 2-point era. The Inter of Records was completed that day, during a head-to-head match with Napoli.