Inter’s Champions League Night and Dimarco’s Future

Inter’s Bernabeu night has more than one big meeting on the agenda.

While Simone Inzaghi’s side prepare to launch their Champions League campaign against Real Madrid at the Bernabeu this evening (20.00 UK, 21.00 CEST), the club hierarchy are also moving on a crucial piece of business: Federico Dimarco’s future.

Dimarco absent on the pitch, central in the stands

Inter travel to Spain without the injured Dimarco and Djed Spence, a double blow on the flanks for a side that leans heavily on its wing-backs. Dimarco has been working with a support strap on his knee in recent days and did not make the squad for Madrid.

Yet his name still dominates the Inter agenda.

Sky Sport Italia report that Dimarco’s agent, Arturo Canales, is in the stands in Madrid and has used the occasion to sit down in person with Inter’s new director of sport, Dario Baccin. The Bernabeu, for one night, doubles as a boardroom.

This is no courtesy call. Dimarco recently made it clear he was still waiting for a concrete proposal on a new deal, despite his current contract running until June 2028. For a player of his stature, that silence had started to sound loud.

A player at the peak of his leverage

Dimarco could hardly be in a stronger position. The left-back was just crowned Serie A Player of the Season for 2025/26, a campaign in which he underlined his status as one of Inter’s true reference points and a key figure for Italy.

The image from May at San Siro still lingers: Dimarco on the Giuseppe Meazza pitch, posing with the Scudetto and Coppa Italia trophies after the win over Hellas Verona, a local boy standing at the centre of Inter’s success. That is the profile walking into these negotiations.

He wants a salary that reflects it. Inter know they cannot afford to drag this out.

New director, same priority

For Baccin, the meeting also marks an early test in his new role. Long the right-hand man to Piero Ausilio, he has now stepped into the spotlight as director of sport and must immediately handle one of the club’s most sensitive renewals.

Securing Dimarco is about more than numbers on a contract. It is a statement about how Inter intend to protect the core of a title-winning squad at the very moment they step back onto the Champions League stage.

The match in Madrid will tell one story about where this team stands in Europe. The conversation in the stands may tell an even bigger one about where Inter are heading.