No team in Serie A does self-destruction better than Inter Milan as the Mauro Icardi saga took another twist as Inter boss Luciano Spalletti claimed that his best player ‘embarrassed’ Inter on the eve of their Europa League last-32 first leg against Rapid Vienna.
Icardi was stripped of Inter’s captaincy on Wednesday morning, before it emerged that the striker had made himself unavailable for the trip to Vienna.
Speaking at the press conference ahead of Inter’s Europa League tie, Spalletti has this to say about his former captain:
“Icardi? We’ll pursue the appropriate action in light of the positions that have been taken.
“Nothing has changed from a technical point of view, but we’ve been embarrassed and unfortunately we won’t have him at our disposal tomorrow.
“Still, we’ll be able to call on someone like Lautaro who showed his quality at Parma. We’ll need him right away, here in Vienna.
“I expect the same contribution from him and the same from the others.”
Unsurprisingly, the questions kept coming about a certain topic…
“I see you [journalists] are interested in the game,” interjected Spalletti.
“The ball is round and the pitch is rectangular. We have to win the game and I have the obligation to focus on the match.
“We can talk about what you want during the week but since Icardi won’t play, now we’re thinking about the game tomorrow.”
Difficult times for Inter and Spalletti, who has seen his side win