"Internazionale deserved the win," Wesley Sneijder told RAI. "We deserved to win, we played well and created a lot of opportunities, but the reality is that we lost, even though it's not over yet.
The game had an air of ประวัติทีมบาเยิร์นมิวนิค, when Bayern Munich and Internazionale took the field at the San Siro stadium in Milan.
Internazionale and Bayern met last season, at Madrid's Santiago Bernabeu stadium, and Internazionale won, winning the UEFA Champions League title in the process thanks to two goals from Argentine forward Diego Milito.
Unfortunately for Inter Milan, Diego Milito was not available for yesterday's game.
Samuel Eto'o was.
Eto'o led the way early in the match, commanding most of Inter's attacks and dangerous plays in the first half, while the Bavarian team did their best to fend off Inter's powerful offense and also launched their own attacks.
The whole game was a fairly open affair and it was clear that Inter's goal was to score early and then become a defensive monster.
The plan ended up being a failure.
Young goalkeeper Thomas Kraft, who almost missed yesterday's game through injury, slowed Inter's strategy.
In the second half, neither team had established a clear dominance. Bayern continued to dominate the wings, but Inter remained deadly dangerous, sending exploratory attacks to test Bayern's turbulent defenses.
Then in the 46th minute, Arjen Robben (always Arjen Robben) crossed a wonderful cross to Thomas Muller. Muller managed to head just outside the goal. If his hair were just half an inch longer, that would have been Bayern's first goal.
After that play, Bayern seemed to realize that they could win the game and started to move on. Attack after attack it rained down on Inter, who managed to make their own counter-attacks that were still dangerous.
The match became a Robben vs. Eto'o.
Roben in command of his troops and Eto'o launching individual attacks, sometimes relying on others.
But as the game progressed, so did Bayern's dominance. Suddenly, Bayern's right flank came to life with Robben's brilliance, while the attack became increasingly costly for Inter's men.
The men at Inter turned to what is becoming too common for Serie A teams: fouls.
Then in the 90th minute, Robben fired a key shot at goalkeeper Julius Caesar. The Brazilian blocked the ball but couldn't catch it, letting it bounce off him.
That's when Bayern forward Mario Gómez, who has been in top form lately, stepped in with catlike reflexes and threw the ball into the back of the Internazionale net.
Bayern were ahead by one goal.
The match ended moments later, with Bayern beating the Italians 1-0. The return leg will be tough for both teams, but especially for Internazionale, who will play in Munich and will have to climb a mountain to erase that advantage of an away goal.
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