The numbers of an extraordinary Scudetto

A magical and extraordinary season. At precisely 22:45 CEST on 22 April, when the final whistle was blown in the derby, the Nerazzurri became Champions of Italy for the 20th time. The Second Star arrived after a magnificent journey full of victories and record-breaking numbers that we now want to revisit.

A HISTORIC ACHIEVEMENT

Inter became the first team to mathematically clinch the Scudetto in a city derby since the introduction of the round-robin format. 22 April is a lucky day for the Nerazzurri. Back in 2007, Inter also won the championship on the same day, beating Siena 2-1 on the road with a brace from Materazzi. That season, too, Inter won the Scudetto with five games to spare. Inter are the first team in Serie A history to achieve this feat on two separate occasions. Overall, it's only the sixth time that the Serie A title has been decided with five games still to play.

Inter finished the season on 94 points. This is the fourth highest tally of all time in a single Serie A campaign: only Inter in 2006/07 (97), Juventus in 2013/14 (102) and Juventus in 2017/18 (95) have done better than this. Torino also achieved 94 points in 1947/48 (if we apply the three-points-per-win rule).

The Nerazzurri finished with 19 more points than AC Milan, who came second. This represents the second highest points difference between the top two sides in Serie A in the three-points-per-win era: in 2006/07, the Nerazzurri finished 22 points ahead of second-place Roma.

AMONG THE BEST NUMBERS IN EUROPE

Inter won Serie A with the best attack and best defence for the first time since 2009/10 (when they scored 75 and conceded 34). In general, they achieved this feat for the fifth time in history in the competition.

Inter conceded the fewest goals (22) and had the best goal difference (+67) across the top five European divisions in 2023/24. Furthermore, no side won more matches than the Nerazzurri (29, the same as Real Madrid), and Real Madrid were the only team to pick up more points (95 compared to 94).

Inter's 2023/24 side recorded the fifth highest goal difference of all time in Serie A: +67. Only Torino in 1947/48 (+92), AC Milan in 1949/50 (+73), Torino in 1946/47 (+69) and AC Milan in 1950/51 (+68) have done better.

During the season just gone, Inter became the first team ever to score at least one goal in each of the first 31 matches of the campaign, a streak that ended at 34. Additionally, the Nerazzurri found the net in 42 consecutive Serie A matches, setting a new record in Inter's history.

In 2023/24, Inter scored their third highest number of goals in Serie A history: 89, like in 2020/21. Only in 1949/50 and 1950/51 (107) have the Nerazzurri done better.

During the campaign just gone, Inter went on a 28-game unbeaten run (between 30 September and 28 April), the second-longest streak the Nerazzurri have ever recorded in a single Serie A campaign (after 31 games without defeat between September 2006 and April 2007).

THE STELLAR BOSS: SIMONE INZAGHI

Simone Inzaghi is the twelfth coach in Inter's history to win Serie A. The Nerazzurri boss now sits third in the ranking of Inter coaches with the most trophies.

Out of those who have taken charge for at least 50 games, Simone Inzaghi has the second highest points-per-game average in Inter's Serie A history: 2.19 points per game.

AN UNMISTAKABLE STYLE OF PLAY

Inter conceded the fewest goals (22) and kept the most clean sheets (21) in the top five European leagues in 2023/24. Across a single Serie A season, this represents a clean sheet record for the Nerazzurri, who beat their previous best of 20 in 1988/89. In the campaign just gone, Inter were the only team to avoid conceding in the first 15 minutes of play across the top five European leagues.

Again considering the best five divisions in Europe, Inter (one) are one of four teams that either lost just once or not at all away from home in 2023/24. Bayer Leverkusen (zero), Paris Saint-Germain (zero) and Real Madrid (one) are the other sides in this exclusive group.

In addition to being defensively sound, the Nerazzurri were also highly effective with their build-up play. Indeed, Inter had the highest percentage of successful passes in Serie A (87.4%). Furthermore, in the Italian top flight, the Champions of Italy scored nine goals from open play following moves involving at least ten passes: no team did better in this regard (Roma with nine, too).

Inter like to control play: during their league match against Udinese on 8 April, the Nerazzurri had 76.9% possession, the highest percentage recorded by the Nerazzurri in a match across the past 20 seasons in Serie A.

Across the top five European divisions in 2023/24, Inter are one of three teams to have had seven defenders find the net at least once (Werder Bremen and Newcastle are the other two): Federico Dimarco (5), Denzel Dumfries (4), Francesco Acerbi (3), Yann Bisseck (2), Matteo Darmian (2), Stefan de Vrij (1) and Alessandro Bastoni (1). In general, only Bayern Leverkusen scored more goals through defenders (28) than Inter (18).

CAPTAIN AND GOALSCORER: LAUTARO MARTINEZ

Lautaro Martínez is the third Inter player to have scored at least 20 goals for three consecutive seasons in Serie A, after Giuseppe Meazza (five - from 1929/30 to 1933/34) and Stefano Nyers (four - from 1948/49 to 1951/52).

With 24 goals to his name, Lautaro Martínez was the top scorer in Serie A in 2023/24. In the 21st century, only four times has the team with the division's highest scorer also won the Scudetto: David Trézéguet and Juventus in 2001/02, Andriy Shevchenko and AC Milan in 2003/04, Zlatan Ibrahimovic and Inter in 2008/09, and Victor Osimhen and Napoli in 2022/23.

Lautaro Martínez is also only one of five players to have scored more than 20 goals in three consecutive Serie A seasons in the last 65 years, alongside Gabriel Batistuta, Antonio Di Natale (four), Edinson Cavani, and Cristiano Ronaldo.

Lautaro Martínez is one of seven players to have bagged at least 24 goals in the top five European leagues in 2023/24, alongside Harry Kane (33), Kylian Mbappé (26), Serhou Guirassy (25), and Lois Openda (23).

Lautaro scored 15 league goals away from home in 2023/24: no Inter player has ever done better in a single top-flight season (Romelu Lukaku and Stefano Nyers also bagged 15 in 2019/20 and 1949/50, respectively).

THE PROTAGONISTS

In addition to Lautaro, two other players surpassed the 10-goal mark in Serie A: Marcus Thuram and Hakan Çalhanoglu both scored 13. The last time three Inter players scored at least 13 goals in a single top-flight season was in 1951/52 (back then, Stefano Nyers bagged 23, Benito Lorenzi scored 15 and Pietro Broccini found the net 13 times).

Tikus is the second Inter player to have scored more than 10 goals and provided more than five assists in his first Serie A season with the Nerazzurri, after Samuel Eto'o (12+6 in 2009/10). The Turk, meanwhile, has become the highest scoring Inter midfielder across a single campaign in the three-points-per-win era; the last midfield man to do better than this in Nerazzurri colours was Lothar Matthäus, who reached 16 in 1990/91.

Henrikh Mkhitaryan (two goals and eight assists) is the third Inter player aged 34+ to have reached double figures in terms of combined goals and assists in a single campaign across the past 20 seasons. He's followed in the footsteps of Sinisa Mihajlovic (ten in 2004/05) and Edin Dzeko (18 in 2021/22 and twelve in 2022/23). Davide Frattesi is the midfielder who scored the most goals after the 90-minute mark during the season just gone (three goals, against AC Milan, Hellas Verona and Udinese).

Nicolò Barella is the midfielder who was involved in the most moves from open play that ended with a shot in Serie A in 2023/24: a total of 199. In general, only Khvicha Kvaratskhelia (230) and Matías Soulé (201) did better.

Federico Dimarco è il difensore che ha preso parte a più reti in questa Serie A: 11 (frutto di cinque gol e sei assist), almeno tre in più di ogni altro. Federico Dimarco is the defender who directly contributed to the most goals during the Serie A season just gone: eleven (five goals and six assists), at least three more than any other player. Yann Sommer kept 19 clean sheets in the Italian top flight in 2023/24. No non-Italian goalkeeper has ever done better in a single Serie A season in the three-points-per-win era (Sebastian Frey also collected 19 for Fiorentina in 2006/07). In the same period (since 1994/95), the Swiss international is the Inter shot-stopper to have collected the most clean sheets across a single campaign (Julio César in 2009/10 and Samir Handanovic in 2017/18 and 2018/19 previously reached a tally of 17).

Four Inter players were included in the Serie A 2023/24 top XI based on Opta data. They are Alessandro Bastoni (selected as the best defender by Lega Serie A), Federico Dimarco, Hakan Calhanoglu (best midfielder in 2023/24) and Lautaro Martinez (Serie A top scorer and best overall player).