Sandro Mazzola has died at 83: the memory of Inter and Italian football

FC Internazionale Milano, president Giuseppe Marotta, vice-president Javier Zanetti, manager Cristian Chivu and his staff, the players and the entire Inter world join in deep sorrow at the passing of Sandro Mazzola, a Nerazzurri legend and a legend of world football, and, in remembering him, embrace his family.

Remembering him brings restraint as well: how hard it is to find the right words to bid farewell to someone who wrote history, truly wrote it, in an indelible and unprecedented way.

Already there is a melancholy that will not leave us, because it still feels as though we can see him here, between the club headquarters and Appiano, recalling Puskas, Herrera, Suarez and Corso, one anecdote after another, each one immediately tied to the present day, the desire for Inter alive in his eyes, wanting to talk about Lautaro and our Inter, the Inter of now, the Inter of always.

Sandro Mazzola was one of the greatest footballers in history. Not only in Nerazzurri history. He was Inter's history: he arrived as a boy and never left. He carried a heavy burden on his shoulders, the memory of a father who seemed invincible. His destiny also brought him two legendary Nerazzurri who, in effect, would raise him and guide him along the path of history.

One shirt for a lifetime, one dream alone. He had to build it without a father, lost in the Superga disaster, that of Grande Torino. Alessandro, known to everyone as Sandro, Sandrino, was six years, five months and 23 days old. He saw the devastated faces of the people embracing him and stroking his head, and wondered what was happening. Sandro came to know what Valentino had been through the epic passed down day by day. He started to absorb it at the San Lorenzo oratory in Milan, in Porta Ticinese, in full-pitch matches against Adriano Celentano. Inter men did not shape his growth alone: Giuseppe Meazza and Benito Lorenzi did too. Meazza developed him technically, teaching him every secret. Lorenzi turned up at Sandro's home in Cassano d'Adda with boots and a ball. By the age of eight, Mazzola and his brother were, in effect, Inter's mascots: between the pitch, dressing rooms and stadium, a total Nerazzurri education.

Then he skipped the stages and grew up quickly out of necessity. Sandrino did it fast, helped by events too. Born in 1942, he was thrown into the first team in the infamous replay of Juventus v Inter on 10 June 1961 in Turin. From a school oral exam to the trip to the Piedmont capital, where Moratti and Herrera fielded the Primavera. It ended 9-1, and Inter's scorer that day was a slim boy with a fine touch: Sandro Mazzola. He was 18.

Today we would call him a second striker. An 8 and a 10, like the shirts he wore at Inter. Midfielder or centre-forward? Herrera built the right role around him and unleashed an extraordinary rise in that spectacular army that was the Grande Inter. His consecration came very early, blessed by the giants of world football. The Prater in Vienna, the 1964 European Cup final. As they walked out, it was Suarez who pushed Mazzola on to the pitch: Sandro had stayed behind admiring his idols outside the dressing rooms, Di Stefano, Puskas and the other Real Madrid champions. Then came two goals. A brace in the European Cup final, Inter's first European triumph, an unprecedented success bearing Mazzola's signature and Puskas's congratulations: “You are worthy of your father Valentino,” the great Hungarian told him, giving him his shirt.

We know these stories by heart. We have heard them again and again without ever tiring of them, always finding a new detail, always told in that affable voice moved by memory. He had a sense of devotion and total gratitude towards Inter – “for me, like a mother” – and repaid it with an endless stream of plays, goals and wonders. Four Serie A titles, two European Cups, 2 Intercontinental Cups, the Serie A top scorer title (in 1965 with 17 goals) and the European Cup top scorer title (7 goals in 1964). Runner-up in the 1971 Ballon d'Or behind Johan Cruyff.

There was the Grande Inter of Angelo Moratti, Helenio Herrera, Sarti, Burgnich and Facchetti. Mazzola was there, between midfield and attack, drawing trajectories and scoring goals. European nights, afternoons at the Meazza. Huge, unforgettable goals. His hallmark against Independiente in the Intercontinental Cup, the comeback against Liverpool stamped by him and celebrated to “When the Saints Go Marching In” blaring through the loudspeakers at San Siro. And more: the goal in the derby after 13 seconds, the goal in Inter v Lazio in 1966 that delivered the First Star. All the way to 1977. In between came the European Championship with Italy, the World Cups, the relay with Rivera.

Seventeen seasons, 565 official appearances, 158 goals. His bond with Inter never ended, first as an executive and then as sporting director. He had unique intuition behind a desk as well. Platini and Falcao, then missed out on. Zenga, brought back to Milan from Sambenedettese. And, above all, Ronaldo. The Fenomeno arrived after the pressure applied by Moratti and Mazzola, precisely. When R9 was presented at the Nerazzurri headquarters, Luis Suarez and Sandro Mazzola stood beside him.

Even in recent years, he kept visiting Inter headquarters. As a member of the Club's Hall of Fame, he always spoke about the unique and indissoluble bond with the Nerazzurri colours. He did so again when recounting it to Lautaro and his team-mates on a recent visit to Appiano Gentile. It was a place where he felt at home, where he remembered the training camps with Herrera, amid wonderful and hilarious anecdotes.

In May 2024, he felt the affection of the Nerazzurri fans first-hand again on the day of the celebration of the Second Star: he, with Bedin and Cappellini, was on the pitch, celebrated for that first star won 58 years earlier.

He shone on the pitch, and his moustachioed star shines now too. A man who, as he often said, had only one final wish: “To be remembered as a good man, one who gives it a go even when it is impossible to win, as in that 9-1.”

We will, Sandro.

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