After winning the Scudetto game against Juventus last Sunday, Inter are now well positioned to win the 2023-24 Serie A title as the Nerazzurri are now four points ahead of the Bianconeri and also have one game in hand. However, Inter fans need to be careful to not get their hopes up as the end of the season in not around the corner yet. On top of that, recent years showed a worrying trend for the teams coached by Simone Inzaghi, the mastermind behind the success of this team.
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Looking at the past seasons when Inzaghi was at Lazio and his current stint at Inter, the former striker struggled in the months of February and March. Since he took charge of Inter in the summer of 2021, in his first season at the club Inter slowed down after losing 2-1 in the Derby della Madonnina clash on February 5, 2022. That was a deciding moment for Inter, which missed the chance to increase the gap with Stefano Pioli's team that from that moment on started a run that led them to win the title a few months later.
After 25 games, Inter were one point behind the Rossoneri and the calendar was smiling at Inzaghi who had to face Sassuolo, Genoa, Salernitana, Torino and Fiorentina in the following five matches. Inter, however, only won against Salernitana and, on Matchday 30, they were six points behind Pioli's team.
In his last three seasons at Lazio, he lost at least five games in the last 15 matchdays of the season, and despite not competing to win the title, it was still a lot. Last season, things got even worse. From Feb. 26 to April 15, Inter lost five games (against Bologna, Spezia, Juventus, Fiorentina and Monza), drew against Salernitana and only won once against Lecce at home. Even if the title race was over for months with Napoli dominating the league, Inzaghi saved his job thanks to the European campaign that saw Inter advance until the final of the Champions League against Manchester City and also thanks to the Coppa Italia win as in the league Inter lost 13 games at the end of the season, more than one-third of the overall matches played.
Inter and especially coach Inzaghi now need to break this trend if they want to win the title. The Nerazzurri will face a tough month in February with five games in 18 days. On Saturday, Inter will visit AS Roma and Romelu Lukaku at the Stadio Olimpico in Rome, and next Friday, Inzaghi will face his brother Filippo, who is at Salernitana now. After that, Inter will face Atletico de Madrid in San Siro for the first round of the Champions League round of 16 and will travel away to face Lecce before playing Atalanta in Milan. A crucial month ahead that will tell us more about the title race and also if Inzaghi is able keep his foot on the pedal rather than go in reverse.
