MILAN: Inter Milan will face Bayern Munich in the quarter-finals of the Champions League after seeing off Feyenoord 2-1 on Tuesday to complete a comfortable 4-1 aggregate victory. A thumping early strike from Marcus Thuram and Hakan Calhanoglu’s penalty at the San Siro gave Inter comfortable passage to the last eight, where the Italian champions will face a blockbuster clash with Bayern Munich.

Inter lead Serie A and there is talk in Italy that Simone Inzaghi’s team have a chance at repeating the league, Italian Cup and Champions League treble won by Jose Mourinho 15 years ago. “It’s not about believing or not believing (in the treble), when you’re at Inter you play every game to win. If you win every match you’ll do great things,” said Thuram.

Standing in Inter’s way next month will be Bayern after they swept aside Bayer Leverkusen, who beat Inter during the league phase. Inzaghi is hoping that he will have his first XI available for what will be the biggest matches of the season for Inter who are keen to go one better than 2023 when they lost the Champions League final to Manchester City.

“It will be a complicated match. They’re solid and very well coached but we’ll go for it just as we have against everyone, playing against other top teams,” said Inzaghi. “I hope we’ll have everyone available for the tie... We brought on two players from the youth team near the end and I told them that they’ll need to give us a hand because we’re a bit short at the moment.”

Feyenoord’s deepest run in Europe’s top club competition in decades ended with a whimper although the away side did briefly look like making a game of it when Jakub Moder rattled in a penalty three minutes before the break. Inter could have easily won by more after missing a clutch of good chances, with Thuram drilling a great opportunity against the bar moments before being substituted to rapturous applause with 19 minutes remaining.

No surprises

The hosts were already comfortably ahead from their dominant first-leg display in Rotterdam but Thuram made sure there would be no nasty surprises in the eighth minute. The France forward received a ball from Carlos Augusto on the left flank and then charged towards goal, cutting inside onto his right foot and unleashing a ferocious shot against which Timon Wellenreuther could do nothing to stop.

That goal made it near impossible for Feyenoord, now led by former Netherlands striker Robin van Persie whose team showed willing even with 11 players out of action through injury or suspension. Up to Thuram’s opener, Simone Inzaghi’s 200th game as Inter coach had been played in near silence bar sporadic chanting from the 5,000 away supporters, as home fans stayed silent for the first 20 minutes in protest at the increasing cost of tickets for home matches.

Inzaghi, himself hit with a series of important absences including Italy wing-back Federico Dimarco, also rested star striker Lautaro Martinez, Nicolo Barella, Francesco Acerbi and Alessandro Bastoni with a huge match at Serie A title rivals Atalanta coming up at the weekend.

It was one of Inzaghi’s regulars in Calhanoglu who gave Feyenoord a lifeline in the 38th minute when he bundled into Moder to hand the Poland midfielder a chance to level the scores on the night. However Calhanoglu redeemed himself and sent Inter through to meet Bayern five minutes after the break by confidently stroking home from the spot after what looked like a soft foul on Mehdi Taremi by Thomas Beelen.

“It was a dubious penalty in my opinion, maybe given too easily. It seemed to me that there wasn’t much contact,” Van Persie told reporters. “The players worked very hard, they defended well at times. Maybe we could have done better in some situations but we were up against a really good team who play quality football. “The boys did everything, I couldn’t have asked any more from them.” — AFP