Trapattoni's Amazing Inter 1988/89 // TREBLE WINNING 4-3-3

GIOVANNI TRAPATTONI’S INTER 1988-1989: RECORD SEASON

Hi guys, last March 17th was Giovanni Trapattoni's birthday, and to pay homage to one of the greatest Italian managers, I decided to create two of his tactics, this time I will introduce to you his Inter 1988-1989 season tactic.
It can be seen as a 4-3-3 that can easily switch to a 3-5-2 depending on the position of the players.
A record is something historical, something that stands at the top and tells us that if you want to surpass it, you have to do better. Sport thrives on records, on achievements. On performances that are benchmarks or something to try to match or, why not, improve. Football has never been exempt from this, in fact, quite the opposite.
We want to remember a team that rewrote the history of Italian football in the 1988-89 season for its never-surpassed performance: Giovanni Trapattoni's "Inter dei record".
Even today, that team is remembered with affection not only by the fans of the "Biscione", but by all football fans for what it achieved in that fantastic season
Let's start with a side note: the performances of that team were phenomenal for those times when points were only worth two points instead of the current three and only three foreigners (EU and non-EU) could play. At that time, our Serie A was the best of the best possible, so much so that at the end of that season Milan, Napoli and Sampdoria won the three European cups of the time (European Cup, UEFA Cup and Cup Winners' Cup) and for the first time in history the European Super Cup was played by teams from the same country.
Our footballing level was high and our top league featured the best players of the time, especially Italians. Our football was a source of pride, everywhere.
In that context, and in those years, the Inter of president Ernesto Pellegrini was always fighting for a place in the UEFA Cup. In the last ten seasons, the Biscione had won one scudetto, one Coppa Italia and the best finishes had been three third places, while in Europe the top were a semi-final of the European Cup and two of the UEFA Cup.
in the 1986-87 season, the big coup: the arrival of Trapattoni on the bench, the architect of the fantastic Juventus cycle that in the previous ten years had won all the international cups and six league titles.
However, Trap's arrival was not positive at the beginning: a third and a fifth place in the standings which at that time meant only a UEFA placement.
Those were the years of Maradona's Napoli, the Dutch Milan and the Sampdoria of the "twins" Vialli and Mancini. The Nerazzurri fans were grumbling and wanted the coach's head, also because the results were really modest despite the expectations. The 1988-89 season was that of the possible signing of a third foreigner in the team: real phenomena arrived in Serie A, but also players of little importance despite the money spent to buy them from their respective teams.
The tournament went from sixteen to eighteen teams, a novelty that had been missing for twenty-one seasons: two more teams and four relegations. This format lasted until 2004-05, when Serie A went to 20 teams after fifty-two years, while starting from the 1994-95 season a win was worth three points. The 1988-89 season started for Inter with the reconfirmation, without ifs and buts, of Trapattoni and Pellegrini decided to revolutionize the team: out Scifo, Passarella, Rummenigge (two seasons earlier) and Spillo Altobelli to make room for people who will write the history of the Glorious Inter: Nicola Berti from Fiorentina, Alessandro Bianchi from Cesena, Ramon Diaz from Fiorentina, and two Germans from
Bayern Munich who will become true legends, Lothar Matthäus and Andreas Brehme.
Inter started the season among the top positions, although in that championship the competitors had significantly strengthened their teams: Milan completed their trio of Dutch players with the arrival of Frank Rijkaard from Real Zaragoza, Napoli bolstered their midfield with the Brazilian Alemão, Juventus (far from the glories of the recent past for at least three seasons) brought the first Soviet player in Italian football history, Alexander Zavarov, and the Portuguese Rui Barros (in addition to the former Inter player Alessandro Altobelli); Fiorentina had signed Stefano Borgonovo, Carlos Dunga, and Roberto Pruzzo.
Inter was there, ready to fight shoulder to shoulder to reclaim the tricolor and return to the European Cup. The season started poorly with elimination from the Coppa Italia in the second group stage at the hands of Fiorentina. The same fate befell them in the UEFA Cup in the spring, being eliminated by Bayern Munich in the round of 16. But what matters today is the league, and that team achieved the feat: 34 matches, 26 victories, six draws, two defeats, 67 goals scored, and nineteen goals conceded.
A leadership never questioned, so much so that the team had practically sealed the deal five matchdays before the end of the championship, securing its thirteenth league title.
The first half of the season was won by Bergomi and his teammates with eleven victories, four draws, and only one defeat, which came in the last match against Fiorentina in Tuscany. They held a one-point advantage over Napoli. For the Neapolitans, the remote possibility of overtaking Inter in the second half of the season faded away because the Milanese team accelerated, and with five matchdays remaining, they held a seven-point lead. In a league where a win was worth two points, such a margin was difficult to recover.
Mathematics crowned Inter on May 28, 1989, with a 2-1 victory against Napoli just four matchdays before the end of the championship: the visitors took the lead with Careca, the hosts equalized with Berti, and in the 83rd minute, Matthäus's precise free kick beat Giuliani. It was a decisive victory, mathematically securing the title, and after nine years, Inter was crowned champions of Italy. The final tally was overwhelming: eleven points ahead of the second-placed team, twelve points ahead of the third-placed team, and thirty-six points ahead of the last-placed team.
With hindsight, Dossena's statement, the playmaker of Sampdoria who, finishing in fifth place, ended up nineteen points behind, proved prophetic: the opponents weren't weak; it was just that Inter was too strong, running faster than the others who were moving at a normal pace. Therefore, Napoli was the champion of Italy in the league of "normal" teams, not the "aliens."
To top it off, the top scorer of the league was none other than an Inter player: Aldo Serena, then 29 years old, with a past rich in derby matches, having worn the shirts of Milan, Juventus, Torino, and Inter in the span of six seasons. It had been seventeen seasons since an Inter player had won the top scorer title, dating back to Roberto Boninsegna's victory in the 1971-72 season. Since then, only three other Inter forwards have won the top scorer title: Christian Vieri (2002-03), Zlatan Ibrahimović (2008-09), and Mauro Icardi twice, in 2014-15 and 2017-18.
Who were the architects of Inter's triumph? It's easy to say it was a collective effort, but there are distinctions to be made. Firstly, the acquisition of Lothar Matthäus, who arrived for around 6 billion lire from Bayern Munich, was a successful move, as he quickly erased the two lackluster seasons of Rummenigge in just a few matches.
A valuable acquisition indeed, so much so that thanks to the number 10 from Erlangen who scored the title-winning goal against Napoli, Inter could boast the championship. Matthäus was a complete player, decisive, with international experience, who the following year won the World Cup with Germany and the Ballon d'Or.
The arrival of the tenacious striker and Brehme was the response to Milan and their three Dutch players who, in the two previous seasons (with Gullit and van Basten, winning three Ballon d'Or awards in three consecutive years), had brought about the revolution under Arrigo Sacchi. Another crucial player was Nicola Berti, 21 years old and having a fantastic season. Even today, the video of his goal against Bayern Munich in the UEFA Cup first leg, starting from... his own house, is highly viewed. Berti, with his slicked-back hair and carefree demeanor, was one of the key points of Italy under Vicini in the following year's Italian World Cup.
Worthy of note were also the performances of Zenga, then the best goalkeeper in the world; the tested defensive duo of Bergomi and Ferri, the midfield led by Matteoli and Brehme, and in attack, the goals scored by Ramon Diaz. It's worth considering that the former Avellino and Fiorentina player wasn't even supposed to come to Inter because the Nerazzurri had opted for "Allah's heel," Rabah Madjer, but the Algerian didn't pass the medical tests. A fortunate fallback indeed.
And then there was Giovanni Trapattoni, the sixth coach capable of winning two league titles with two different teams. A strategist of Italian football in the 1970s and 1980s, silent about being a "catenacciaro" (a defensive-minded coach), but who, with Inter, achieved the satisfaction of winning and convincing, becoming one of the best coaches in the history of football, not just in Italy. It's thanks to him that a team like Inter became a "Football Legend." Another "Football Legend" could be Mourinho's Inter, which in the 2009-10 season achieved the treble, winning the league title, Coppa Italia, and the Champions League in the same season.
With this tactic I won the treble the first season with Inter Milan, I did not use player transfer sessions so the squad is the same at the begining and at the end of the season. I dominated the xg and possession in most of the games.


WHAT IF

1. If you struggle to score:
switch the mentality to attacking, switch the left wing-back -support to attack or even to a complete wing-back in attack, the complefe forward-support to attack, and change the tempo to sligthly higher.

PLAYERS POSITION AND INSTRUCTIONS
1. The right nonsense fb is a marking defender more than a support fb, he will remain in defense, closer to the other CD (that's why I selected sit narrower as a PI) and mark one of the strikers if the opponent team has 2 strikers (a striker duo was the most common formation in the 80s and 90s) while the stopper (that in the game is a central defender with stopper duty) mark the other striker. These were Bergomi (fb) and Ferri (stopper)'s roles and duties, while Mandorlini, the libero was not assigned a one-to-one marking task and was more free to support the play building. That's why for the libero role I also selected the dribble more instruction. With this selected, our libero will carry the ball forward, dribble more does not mean that our player will try to dribble the opponents and take so many risks like if he was Leo Messi, but that he will, according to the situation, carry the ball forward and try to help the midfield to buld the play.
2. The right winger on support is the best choice for Alessandro Bianchi's role in a 4-3-3 because he was the typical number 7, able to cover the whole right flank and to drop deeper in defense if needed. But his crosses were also very important in attack, especially for Aldo Serena's head-scoring skills.
3. Andy Brehme's role was much more than a left full-back, he was a real game changer when he pushed forward and pumped so many crossed into the box, besides, he was ambidestrous ( he trained a lot to cross with both feet) so the opponents never know what to expect from him. That's why I chose an advanced wing-back role for him instead of dropping him down alongside the other 3 defenders.
4. Ramon Diaz's role can be seen as a complete forward (support) or also as a deep-lying forward, I believe that the complete forward in support can replicate this role better because Diaz was not only a striker who linked the play dropping deeper but was also a great striker. who played well with Serena.

Tactical overview



In possession



In transition



Out of possession