It Feels Nice To Be Wanted

Hitting up Google images for a picture of Mancini – that’s current Milan loanee Alessandro Faiolhe Amantino Mancini, not the scarf-wearing Man City boss – should tell you just about everything you need to know about his stint with Inter:

Not a single picture of the eight in black & blue. (Though the Boom Boom Mancini photo might sum things up nicely too.)

All pictures of Amantino from the Roma glory days. Which makes it no surprise that he was shipped on loan to not-quite-friendly crosstown rivals Milan, which then prompted him to bury Inter because he’d felt unwanted. He should probably get used to that.

Mancini, unlike Lampard, was not worthy of the famed Mourinho shower treatment, but he still got the “I swear I’ll call you” and “yeah, we’ll be together” and “she means nothing to me” treatments. Lies, lies, lies.

“I have thrown away six months,” he said. “I was close to leaving Inter last summer but Mourinho told me that he believed in me. Patience… now we turn the page.

“Mourinho is good but I am now with Leonardo, someone who understands football. I would gladly cancel the past year but now the time has come to turn the page. A new adventure begins for me.”

Six appearances – five of them substitutes – in the league later and he was punted shortly from one side of the San Siro to the other. This obviously made him very, very happy to be at a place where he’ll be appreciated and wanted and all those bubbly feel-good things.

Just ask Silvio Berlusconi, who’s chuffed to bits to have Amantino on the red & black side of town:

“I don’t understand it at all,” he said.

“He’s another winger while we maybe needed someone to finish off chances. He’s not really played for two years, I’m not in agreement with the signing and I told [club vice-president, Adriano] Galliani.”

Ah yes, it’s good to be loved.

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Category: Serie A, World Football