Twitter is, among other things, a place to meet people.

A couple of days ago, I met an Inter Milan fan.

See, I was weeping in my own misery after the Juventus loss to Ajax and tweeted the following, clearly trying to find some sort of solace even though my team’s entire season was destroyed by a bunch of Dutch teenagers (embarrassing for both Juventus and me, I know!):

Fans of other Serie A teams should be happy about Juve losing — why wouldn't they be?

As a Juve fan it feels good in a way to watch Inter, Roma, Milan and others mock Juve after the loss. It reminds me how irrelevant in Europe their clubs have been for a while now.

— Hunter Sharpless (@hrsharpless) April 16, 2019

The tweet raises one point that I want to write about on another occasion — I think rooting for teams in your own league, conference, country, etc. is stupid — but an Inter Milan fan retorted the following:

What have you got to show for your relevance in Europe over the last 22 years https://t.co/9ppsYsoeDJ

— O L A Y I N K A (@OlayinkaOlonade) April 17, 2019

Then I said this:

unfortunately no UCL crown, and it obviously stings quite a bit.

the eight straight Scudettos are nice, though, and there's also the priceless feeling of watching Inter trying to be good. https://t.co/DolhbOZh2C

— Hunter Sharpless (@hrsharpless) April 17, 2019

And finally he said this: 

Then imagine how good it feels to watch juve chase a treble and not succeed in the greatest era in their history ? https://t.co/QviEApdVgL

— O L A Y I N K A (@OlayinkaOlonade) April 17, 2019

And I thought about that for a long, long time, because it raises an extremely interesting question about what we as fans consider success, and what kind of success we’d like to have given the fact that virtually no success is both total and everlasting. It’s super compelling to me and I want to spend some time thinking about it. 

Thank you, Inter Milan fan!

This, then, is the question: 

Would you rather have Inter Milan’s run in the late 2000s — punctuated by a treble following years of mediocrity — or Juventus’ run in the 2010s — domestic dominance with four straight doubles and consistent UCL relevance with two runners-up finishes?

The funny thing is, I suspect there are a lot of Juve fans right now who would rather the treble no matter the cost, and perhaps a lot of Inter fans who would rather the constant relevance and success rather than cellar-dwelling for so long. 

One note: I’m not counting the 2005-06 Serie A title in Inter’s favor. It’s just too complicated to get into that.

Inter Milan: 2006-2010 by the numbers 

Here’s what Inter accomplished starting in the 2005-06 season:

And because it’s a part of the equation, here’s where they’ve finished domestically since their treble:

2010-11: second 

2011-12: sixth

2012-13: ninth

2013-14: fifth

2014-15: eighth

2015-16: fourth

2016-17: seventh

2017-18: fourth

2018-19: third (not yet over)

Juventus: 2012-2019 by the numbers 

And here’s what Juve have accomplished starting in the 2011-12 season:

The totals

The totals over the history of both clubs somewhat reflect these two shorter runs we’re looking at, too, although I think most people would rather have Juve’s mark here: 

Look, I hope that all Juve and Inter fans can, for a second at least, get their heads out of their asses and really try to assess these two cases. I honestly don’t know which sounds more appealing, even if I try to separate the names from the records. 

I think there are probably some pros and cons to each run; it’s not rocket science to deduce that. Certainly with five consecutive Scudettos, Inter saw more than a “moment” of success, and the treble is the ultimate prize. But the following irrelevance — approaching a decade of it — sounds awful. On the flip side, Juve have endured brutal losses in Champions League finals, keep rolling through Italy, and seem like they’ll have something of a shot in the Champions League over the next couple years at least. 

I don’t know! They honestly both sound pretty good.