AC Milan will take on Inter at San Siro on Sunday, and there will be a battle between two players who experience the derby as a fan.
La Gazzetta dello Sport talk about the ‘Rossonerazzurro DNA’ that Calabria and his opponent Federico Dimarco have, given the latter is a childhood Inter fan and now occupies the left wing-back role for them.
Calabria has spent over half of his life as a Rossoneri player given that he turned 26 in December and has been at the club for 15 years. He experienced his first derby on 3 September 2015 – 2304 days ago – but from the bench.
The Milan captain has played 13 in total with 4 wins, 4 draws, 5 defeats (the last one in the Supercoppa), with an assist for Olivier Giroud, a yellow card and a middle finger in 2020 to the Inter fans.
In the meantime he reached 200 appearances in all competitions for the club, making him the first player in the current squad to cross that line. He feels the weight of captaincy more than most, so much so that on Sunday he went under the Curva Sud after the defeat to Sassuolo with his hands raised to apologise to the fans.
In an interview with DAZN, Calabria revealed himself what it means: “A Milanista is one who puts the team before himself and gives everything for this shirt.” Davide remembers when his parents accompanied him as a child to the big games at San Siro, and he moved from Brescia to Milan when he was a Primavera player.
He struggled to keep up the pace of sport and study and played mostly as a reserve, but now he wears the armband and the Scudetto on his chest. Nonetheless, Calabria is a captain who has to find his way back after ending up in the rough seas of the last few weeks.
Against Lazio and Sassuolo he struggled, but the desire is there for revenge after the Supercoppa defeat and to taste that derby magic again, knowing it tastes sweet as a fan of the club.
