He’s the second Inter player to become champion as a player and as a coach
Internazionale Milano won the Italian championship for the 21st time on Sunday evening, after winning 2-0 against Parma.
For Chivu, it was his first trophy as a senior coach. He also won the title in Italy with Inter in 2008, 2009 and 2010 as a footballer.
For Inter, the title comes two years after its previous one.
On Sunday evening, the goals of Thuram ’45+1 and Mkhitaryan ’80 ensured victory.
With three games to go before the end of the season, Inter have 82 points and can no longer be overtaken by second-placed Napoli, who have 70.
Inter’s players splashed water on coach Cristian Chivu in the dressing room after the 2-0 win over Parma, which brought the Milanese their 21st Italian championship title.
They danced to the song “Made in Romania”, performed by Ionut Cercel in a post that got 120,000 views.
Gazzetta dello Sport: Inter, champions of Italy for the 21st time! In 12 months, from the darkest night to the triumph signed Chivu / The Romanian is the 5th coach in Inter’s history to win on his debut
Thanks to the victory against Parma, Chivu’s Nerazzurri mathematically win the title with three rounds to go. A triumph born of the club’s choices, of Cristian Chivu’s ability to integrate immediately on the bench of a big team, of the usual stars Lautaro, Barella and Dimarco and of the freshness of Pio Esposito, writes Gazzetta dello Sport on Sunday evening.
“The 21st Scudetto began to take shape on the most painful night, that of May 31, 2025, in Munich, in the Champions League final: PSG-Inter 5-0. There, as Simone Inzaghi recently admitted to the Gazzetta, the end of a cycle was felt. Simone took note of this when he left, and the Nerazzurri management began to plan the changes, because not all injuries are the same, some leave traumas. The first fundamental choice: the new coach. It was not a trivial decision to bet on the Romanian Cristian Chivu, the hero of the Triplet, the former helmet fighter. He had won a Scudetto with Inter Primavera (2021) and saved Parma, taken over in November from third place at the bottom of the table, but he was still a young coach, with only 13 games in Serie A.
When they recorded two defeats in the first three rounds, one at home to Udinese and one suffering a comeback in the last 10 minutes at Juventus, many had the feeling of an exaggerated risk,” the Italian newspaper mentions.
Chivu Factor
“On the other hand, Chivu quickly gained credibility. It was smart not to change too much of Inzaghi’s game mechanism, which produced four years of satisfaction. He emphasized the verticality of the maneuvers, but the real strength of Inter was once again the automatism of his lines of play, learned by heart for a long time. As confirmed by the supremacy in the sequences of more than 10 passes. In no other team does the ball circulate so fluidly, making it difficult to find virtuoso associations like those between Alessandro Bastoni and Federico Dimarco on the precious left wing. The absence of Ademola Lookman from Atalanta helped him in a way, sparing him from that tactical re-education that, instead, Conte, Allegri, Spalletti and Gasperini had to face. Cristian could count on a reliable system: 3-5-2. But he legitimized his appointment through secure leadership and solid group management, even in critical moments. She also showed personality in communication, courageous and values-based, with excusable lapses in coherence and exaggerated victimization of criticism. In the end, however, Chivu can consider himself one of the main protagonists of the title and can show some medals: the 5th coach in Inter’s history to win on his debut (the last was Mourinho in 2008-09); first in terms of win percentage (74%), ahead of Conte (68), Inzaghi (66) and Mou (64),” adds Gazzetta dello Sport.
Born on October 26, 1980, in Resita, southwest Romania, Chivu began his professional football career at CSM Resita in 1996, where he remained until 1998, when he moved to the University of Craiova. At Resita, he was coached for a while by his father, who died when Cristi was only 17 years old.
Chivu won the Serie A title after 48 matches as a head coach in Serie A (13 with Parma and 35 with Inter): he surpassed “legendary” names like Conte and Trapattoni, but several managers needed fewer matches to win the league.
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