“I’m here, Inter”

With those words, Antonio Conte has changed the Serie A landscape. It might have been one of the summer’s worst-kept secrets, and the promotional video may have looked more like a deleted scene from Gomorrah than a football club announcing their new coach, but no matter how they opted to tell the world, there is little doubt that the Milanese giants will now present a vastly different proposition for opponents.

The past eight seasons in Italy have of course been dominated by a Juventus side that has won the title in each of those campaigns, and Inter have been among those simply unable to keep pace, recording three fourth-place finishes, and one each in fifth, sixth, seventh, eighth and ninth. They have earned a staggering 230 points fewer than the Bianconeri, this term’s 21-point gap between them the closest the two sides have ended a single season.

I'm here, Inter. ⚫?#WelcomeAntonio #ForzaInter #FCIM #NotForEveryone pic.twitter.com/aIprrGciUD

— Inter (@Inter_en) May 31, 2019

It is the failure to even come close to contending that ultimately caused Inter to part ways with Luciano Spalletti. On the surface, the Tuscan boss had steadied the ship, leading the Nerazzurri to consecutive berths in the top four and securing a much-needed return to Champions League football.

Looking a little more closely revealed that he was not a solution to their problems at all, the former Roma boss often far more likely to exacerbate an issue than alleviate it. Inter — who’s own club song talks about their inherent “craziness” — have often struggled with mental fragility, and the sight of Spalletti stalking the touchline with his head in his hands was hardly the right message to send to the players or supporters.

His press conferences bordered on the ridiculous, the 60-year-old regularly putting on a show for reporters than included shouting, whispering, overexaggerated reenactments of incidents, and constant complaints. Yet in large part this simply felt like a technique to distract anyone from noticing the one truth of Spalletti’s time at Inter; he had been given a very talented squad and squandered it.

There is a strong case to be made that the Nerazzurri have a depth of talent that is second only to Juve, and seeing them finish behind anyone else should be deemed a failure. But because of other issues, somehow fourth place became an achievement. The issues that befell them, whether it was Mauro and Wanda Icardi’s histrionics, Radja Nainggolan’s poor form, and the repeated habit of dropping points from winning positions, were all directly or indirectly aggravated by Spalletti.

It was no surprise therefore that Inter announced his exit just days after their final game of 2018-19, with Conte’s arrival following less than 24 hours later. The two men could not be more different, the contrasts between them as stark as they are obvious. One is a bald, sharply-dressed Tuscan with extremely negative body language, the other hails from the opposite end of the country, constantly pumps up his players from the sideline, and is a walking advertisement for hair transplant surgery.

“When I read Conte was coming to Inter, I thought they’ve found the right person to take them back to the top,” former Juventus winger Emanuele Giaccherini told the Corriere dello Sport last week. “He can bring a winning mentality to those who haven’t found it yet and I can testify with confidence that Conte’s training sessions are shocking. Conte bleeds you dry, because it’s the work on the training ground that he builds his success on. His watchwords are culture of hard work, sacrifice, hunger, and fighting spirit.”

Those comments echo many other similar testimonies from those who have played for Conte in the past, offering some insight into what the new boss will expect. He will suffer no fools, and it is unsurprising to learn of strong indications that Icardi will finally be sold this summer, with Edin Dzeko and Romelu Lukaku touted as possible replacements. That both are extremely professional is no coincidence, while their on-field attributes make them ideal targets for Conte, whose system has often been most successful when he has had a physical striker to deploy as the focal point of his team. 

Links to willing runners like Matteo Darmian follow that same logic, and almost every rumor about Inter seems to add to the feeling that they have appointed the perfect coach to lead them. The rest of the squad should mesh with his approach very well, with defenders Milan Skriniar, Stefan De Vrij, and new arrival Diego Godin appearing an ideal fit for a three-man defense. Some, like Ivan Perisic, Marcelo Brozovic and Matias Vecino seem well-suited too, while Kwadwo Asamoah, Danilo D’Ambrosio, Antonio Candreva, and Andrea Ranocchia have played for Conte before. 

How #Inter could line up under Antonio Conte next season according to @Gazzetta_it pic.twitter.com/yNT5Oft0eU

— Adam Digby (@Adz77) June 3, 2019

His past with Juve will, of course, be a factor, the level of hatred between the Bianconeri and Inter needing no explanation here. Fans of the Turin giants have launched a petition to have his star removed from the Juventus Stadium “walk of fame,” an ideal which had gathered over 13,000 signatures at the time of publication.

Inter supporters have had their say too, a statement from their Ultra leaders warning Conte that “we are not Juve” and that “the Curva Nord certainly can’t forget his black and white past.” It is hardly the ideal starting point, but when the Nerazzurri take to the San Siro turf in August, three points will likely see all that animosity forgotten.

“I hope Conte can win over the hearts of the fans,” Inter legend Marco Materazzi told Sky Italia shortly after the new coach was unveiled. “It won’t be easy, because you can’t forget or cancel out the past, but he is hungry for success. With desire and effort, the Inter fans will grow to love him. It’s up to him to win over everyone’s trust.”

Conte will be fully aware of that and, like Giovanni Trapattoni and Jose Mourinho before him, the new boss has the tenacity, character and mental fortitude to slice through the craziness that so often engulfs this club.” We need to have the same ambition, the same hunger, the same determination, the same enthusiasm to bring Inter back to winning ways, back to where it deserves to be,” he said in a press release. “What I ask for is a sense of belonging because I think this is important if you want to achieve ambitious targets. Given that we are Inter, we need to set ambitious targets.” 

He will push them to do just that, and the presence of Antonio Conte means that Inter — and Serie A as a whole — will be very different next term. 

You can count on it.

Adam Digby is an Italian football writer for FourFourTwo, The Independent, and elsewhere. Author of "Juventus: A History In Black & White." Follow Adam on Twitter.