Inter Milan have continued their dominance in Italy, while I questioned whether they could continue for much longer here, but they’ve continued without much trouble. Inter defeated Roma 3-1 at the San Siro to claim their 5th Italian Super Cup, putting them level with AC Milan. Here’s the match report below, and if you’re interested in reading about the Spanish Super Cup which Barcelona won, click here.

Roma was the better team in the first half, and they went ahead with Riise thanks to Lucio being positionally asleep. Roma were dangerous many more times, but Vucinic and Menez were imprecise in front of goal, and Julio Cesar showing why he’s the best keeper in the world. Inter equalized before halftime with Vucinic and Juan practically passing Pandev into the back of the net, a fluke goal which changed everything for Roma.

The second half was relatively one sided with Eto’o scoring twice to completely crush any of Roma’s hopes. Sneijder was brilliant as he gave sublime assists along with Eto’o who’s dribbling was fantastic as he played closer to the goal. Diego Milito on the other hand wasn’t fit enough and he missed a great chance in front of goal, and another player with a bad night was Lucio who gave Roma their goal and was positionally suspect during the game.

Adriano was subbed in, but he touched the ball once, only to give it away, showing that maybe he isn’t ready to play for Roma. And a peculiarity is that the referee Bergonzi was very one-sided with his decisions, a valid goal disallowed for Inter, and many free kicks around Roma’s penalty box (which Sneijder would’ve been very dangerous from), weren’t given. But in the end, Inter Milan had little trouble and they dominated the second half, with Benitez trying out to play a backline of 5 in the dying minutes… formation change perhaps? We’ll see when Inter play Atletico Madrid in the UEFA European Supercup August 27th.

Inter Milan meet A.S. Roma for the Italian Super Cup this evening in what has become an annual event.

 The Super Cup is a pre-season football competition held the week before the beginning of each season.  It is contested by the winners of Serie A and Coppa Italia from the previous season and helps set the tone for the current season offering bragging rights as the curtain raiser.

During the previous two seasons Inter and Roma have battled to see who would be the ultimate winner.  In 2006 Inter won in extra time 4 – 3, and in 2007 Roma was victorious 1 – 0 when midfielder Daniele De Rossi scored in the 78th minute on a penalty.  The penalty came after a foul by Nicolás Burdisso on Francesco Totti 

This will be the third year in a row the match is played at the San Siro, home turf of Inter.  The competition is normally played in the stadium of last season’s scudetto winner but there have been 3 years when the Super Cup was played outside of Italy, can you name the years and clubs which battled? 

Match time is 20:45 local time

Headlines From Italy Today:

Gazzetta dello Sport – Moratti: I want the Super Cup
Gazzetta dello Sport – Inter start with Ibra, Roma debut Baptista with Totti on the bench
Corriere dello Sport – Inter-Roma, the show starts again
Corriere dello Sport – Italian Super Cup at San Siro tonight