Inter Milan Will Reportedly Change Crest, Name

According to a report from Italian newspaper La Gazzetta dello Sport, Inter Milan – which is formally known as Football Club Internazionale Milano – is set to change its name and crest in the coming months.

The Nerazzurri will be simply known as “Inter Milano” in an attempt to create a closer connection to the city and give the club a more modern global identity. The new crest, meanwhile, will be simplified and feature the initials “IM,” a move that is similar to what Juventus controversially did in 2017.

The changes are set to officially take place on March 9, exactly 113 years to the day after the club was established in 1908.

From March #Inter will no longer be called "Internazionale" but will be referred to as "Inter Milano" with a new badge to boot which has gone down like a lead balloon with the tifosi. pic.twitter.com/PX64RVsJOd
— Steve Mitchell (@barafundler) January 18, 2021

The original crest for Inter Milan, which plays in Italian Serie A, was created by one of the club’s founder, painter Giorgio Muggiani. It was inspired by British clubs and featured the interlocking white monogram “FCIM” on a gold background with black and blue circles around it. The club’s crest has typically centered around that monogram, though there were brief periods where a snake was at the forefront of the Nerazzurri’s design.

In 1928, a new crest was introduced that featured a gold column down the middle and two shields, one with a green snake and a silver crown above it and the other with a red cross and a ax beside it, both of which are Milan heraldic symbols.

That logo lasted just one year and was replaced by a geometric pattern, of sorts, inside circle with blue and black stripes outlined in gold and an Ambrosiana wordmark across the bottom to reflect the club’s name change. The shape changed to a rhombus in 1931, with the full team name “Associaz Sportiva Ambrosiana Inter” around the outside border.

The club returned to its original name and crest in 1945, though done in an inverse color scheme, with the inner circle now white and the monogram now gold.

In 1960, the club introduced a traditional crest with blue and black stripes on one side and a snake and a football (or soccer ball, depending on your nationality) on the other. That became an oval the following year, with a gold snake on top of blue and black stripes with “F.C. Inter” above it.

The Nerazzurri returned to the circular monogram in 1963, but with a brighter gold background. It was refined just three years later with a crest that featured a new serifed font, however.

Inter Milan adopted another new crest in 1978, one that consisted of a traditional shield with a white snake on top of diagonal blue and black stripes with a gold star in the corner. That lasted 10 seasons before the club brought back its original identity, carrying over the star from the previous logo.

The crest has largely remained the same in the 40-plus years since, though it has been continuously modernized in terms of colors and font styles. The current logo, which was introduced in 2014, features the monogram on top of a Vegas gold circle that is enclosed in a black, blue and gold outline, not all that different from the original design.

Photo courtesy of @Inter_en on Twitter.