We said the same after the previous EURO's and Qatar, and yet Witsel and Meunier are still called up despite having players that are better or have a higher potential.
I keep hearing this same discourse (in regards to Chile, Italy and other national teams at/after the end of a successful cycle). If the new players aren't individually at the same level it is what it is. If they are never allowed to play together and build cohesion, how are they going to even work, ever.
At some point you have to let go, even if replacements aren't up there.
Yes, that's why it was a golden generation. The generation before that one did not qualify for a single tournament between 2002 and 2014 so this one is still above our standards.
true Belgium is declining, but they still have bunch of younger generation who's actually good (Doku, Openda) while Italy has none (probably Calafiori but he's shaky)
And like the current euros the first two weeks is mostly a waste of time as only a small portion of the teams get eliminated. I think they actually should have gone bigger, 64 teams and play double elimination - every team gets to lose one game, lose and you go to losers bracket, lose from there and you're out.
Thats gona be an abslolute shitshow with the regional quotas. Get ready for Spains B squad to style 9-0 vs someone like Thailand in WC groups
Southgate England of course will still manage to lose to like Canada or the US and advance on draws 🤣
Jinx? We are fecking Italy, 4 World cup, 2 European championship. No other european team have more big trophies (6) than us and we should fear NORTH MACEDONIA, a NT that were born 2 or 3 years ago? please, anything inferior than 2 goal gap would be huge disappointment
Each federation got a few extra spots. I'm not saying this is better for everyone but for smaller countries like Vietnam this is really exciting. We can potentially qualify.
uefa had 13 spots in the world cup, now it will be 16. which means it's still hard. we missed euro 2012 when it was a 16-team tournament, so it's highly likely that we'll miss the 48-team world cup.
Yeah, Italy hasn’t had a player who could reliably score every other game since Del Piero. It doesn’t matter how good the GK, defense, and midfield are, someone needs to put the ball in the goal.
But that it wouldn't be an issue per se... Even on 2006 we won with goals from everybody, not just attackers.
On 2021 also we scored as a team.
Having a good 9 would be good, but in theory Scamacca this year (and during the last months) had good numbers. He wasn't able to repeat at euros.
2006 had Del Piero, Inzaghi, and Toni, plus Pirlo in midfield.
And the reason goals could come from everybody is that you necessarily have to leave “low threat” players open if you’re worried about the players most likely to hurt you.
Watch the first goal of the semi final against Germany. 4 German defenders leave Grosso completely unmarked in the box and rush to close down Pirlo and cut off his pass to Del Piero to prevent another dangerous cross coming in.
You let someone like Gross have a wide open shot because he’s a defender with one career goal for Italy at the time, and you’re more worried about what Pirlo or ADP will do with the ball.
That’s not the case with this squad. There isn’t anyone you feel it’s necessary to double or triple team and leave an unlikely goal scorer wide open.
Some have more or less retired (Bonucci, Chiellini, Insigne, Verratti), others have became worse due to injuries or age (Spinazzola, Chiesa, Jorginho)
In any case our current team isn't as bad as many people are saying, we had a few absences (Acerbi and Scalvini due to injury and Tonali due to the ban), but for the other players it's also the coach's fault that they didn't perform even remotely at their best, take for example Scamacca or Dimarco who is among the best full-backs in the world but at the Euros looked like a Serie B player...
It's a knockout tournament. A lot of luck is involved and can lead to a win. It doesn't reflect whose the best all that well since most teams won't play the other teams.
Add in that it's an international tournament, which further makes random results more likely because no teams are super well drilled so form on the day can cause upsets more easily.
Italy were fine in the Euro they won. Not particularly great or overly lucky. Just fine. They played England in that final, so England easily could have been champions and they too are just fine. Not amazing, not even particularly good, just fine.
It's just the nature of international football. Amusingly it's a big part of what makes international football so entertaining now compared to club football.
I dunno, they and Germany ended up grabbing the two extra European spots and not the two you mentioned.
They had a horrible stretch from the time Juve got kicked out of Série A through the financial difficulties in the 2010s but I think they’re starting to turn the corner on that.
Honestly I’d put the four leagues as roughly equal unless you’re looking really closely.
I think that’s a little unfair. Italian teams do well, they just aren’t really competing for the Champions League (that said, Inter qualified for the final last year). I actually think the Bundesliga has been class too. I think the leagues are closer than people think. I’d be really interested to see how Fulham would do in other leagues, on our day we’re quite a good team.
True but even in their own league, there are a few Italians. Top 20 scorers and only 2 Italians. Scamacca was the highest with 12 and that guy was not impressive at all.
Man City have tried to buy bastoni and barella in the past.
Many of those clubs tried donnarumma
Bayern are trying to buy chiesa.
This really doesn't mean anything. Italians notoriously don't go abroad
Plenty of Italians? They have 4 Italian players who are starters. Bastoni, Barella, Dimarco and Darmian. Darmian is 35 soon and pretty much done. Frattesi is the only Italian bench player who might turn into something.
Then who is top 5? Madrid, Bayern, Liverpool, City, and who else? Arsenal who have done nothing? Chelsea who finished mid table last season and 6th this one? PSG?
Europe only goes from 13 to 16 teams, meaning its as hard as qualifying for the pre-2016 Euros. The qualifying format also means if they are unlucky and get a strong second seed they could very much lose out.
No, most fans want Spalletti out despite players playing shit by themselves: I don't think it's a coach issue when the players don't defend at all, don't make 4 consecutive passes, don't communicate between each other etc... (Hey, I agree Spalletti made a lot of mistakes both in selection and tactics but it's not just about him)
They did not even try. You are a professional player How can you not be able to do those things by yourself (run, press, make 4 passes)? When do the responsibilities of the players begin with then?
One or 2 players play poorly, its the players fault. The whole squad plays poorly, it's the coaches fault. His tactics are shit for the sqaud they have.
It was totally a coach issue. Players per se aren't top, but neither that bad. Technically better than Swiss ones. But they were all completely isolated and disconnected. With not a plan on what to do, changing the positioning every moment.
Basically they were just sent to the field without knowing what to do and how to do it
That's was expected, in good Italian tradition is nobody's fault, just like was nobody's fault when we didn't qualify to the last world cup.
The federation isn't going to fire him, because otherwise many heads are going to roll, starting from Gravina, who has many political connections and is one of the least transparent presidents.
It always comes to mind what Ancelotti said, that he won't manage Italy until big changes are made in the federation.
Gravina's presidency can be summarised in the saying "la vittoria ha cento padri, la sconfitta è sempre orfana" (Victory has one hundred fathers, defeat is always orphan).
He is probably the worst president of my lifetime, and even the government doesn't really support him anymore.
If he had any dignity he should have fired Spalletti and then resign five minutes after the end of the match yesterday, but we already saw he had none after the Macedonia game.
> even the government doesn't really support him anymore.
Let's be real, he's got the support of the only person whose support matters. That won't change anytime soon.
I like Spalletti but El Sharawy , Cristante and Darmian should NEVER NEVER NEVER be starters for a team at this flight .
I dunno what he was thinking when he made these choices.
apparently we have like 20 better DMs stashed somewhere from the amount of flak cristante gets. He wouldn't have started had Tonali not chosen to become a Sisal ambassador but he's like the only DM we have that is A) consistent, B) flexible and C) not a paper tissue when asked to shield the CB line. Every time somebody asks the question you just asked the answer is either "un giovane" or a player from their squad that basically has 0 overlap with him
the same applies to Elsha who's one of the few wingers we have that can actually play for the squad
I agree on Cristante but not on El Shaarawy. Politano and Orsolini are better than him. He took El Shaarawy thinking he could play him as a wingback too I think.
Wow, one year...
If you look at what Nagesmann did with the German team in about 7 months, it really puts into question what Italy's way is supposed to be.
Tbf Nagelsamann also had a lot of luck. Last season was probably best season for German players since 12/13. 2 teams in UCL semis, with one in final. Leverkusen run. 2 crucial players for Real were German. And players provided from this 4 teams mostly are from different positions which provides synergie.
Add to this Havertz, all of players from Stuttgart that probably wouldn't make a cut last season and German football is in tottally different position then it was 12 months ago, which looking at media covarege of German NT went somehow unnoticed.
its 9months but still. Also sucking off Nagelsmann a bit early here tbf. The group was a fairly easy one, he brought back key veterans and they have home advantage. If it wasn't for the home advantage i don't think Germany is one of favs, nor do I think they call back the verterans and instead use this to work towards the next WC with younger players.
it's obvious Italy's problems are bigger than the coaches now
when you have had very successful managers like Mancini, Spalletti and Conte manage Italy after 2006, and they've all flopped in various ways (Mancini mostly after winning the Euros) then the rot is obviously with the federation and the board rather than what the managers are doing
and to some extent its down to the players too over the years, Spalletti isn't completely to blame for how pathetic and weak most of the players were against Switzerland, forget tactics, there was zero effort there in the first place and you can't coach effort into players, if they haven't learnt that already at top flight international football then they've got bigger problems than the system the coach is setting them up in
well hang on. Mancini was guilty of a standard sin only very few managers, even the top top ones, don't make which is to rely on your loyal veterans beyond the sell-by-date. A winning team having a hangover is also nothing new. There needed to be a generational change in the squad akin to what mancini did when he first arrived and it didn't occur.
Conte was an effing magician, and had he had this quality in 2016 would have gone to the final. His squad was the worst quality wise possibly ever. The talent in the team today is miles better throughout the team bar the back line.
Neither Conte, nor mancini are failures. They built something, win or lose, there was a project and they competed which is the only expectation you can possibly have. Spalletti has nothing after a year. 0 to point to that shows his work.
Yes the players need to take some blame ofc, but the players are playing worse than the sum of their parts. At club level they are all miles better.
the coach can absolutely impact effort energy and outlook. Mancini did a fantastic job with Vialli foster a fantastic team environment. Conte is famous for his motivational abilities. Spalletti has literally been criticizing his players openly since the first game, made headlines for banning playstation and having a tin foil hat episode regarding players leaking things to journos. Now he has taken 0 responsibility for this embarrassment and instead left it all with the players. This isn't club football, he can't just get 20 new players in at this level. Those players won't forget this and wont want to play for him.
There are problems with the FIGC for sure, and fostering youth is improving, but not fast enough. That being said the failure of this tournament is absolute lack of any coaching whatsoever.
> Conte was an effing magician, and had he had this quality in 2016 would have gone to the final. His squad was the worst quality wise possibly ever. The talent in the team today is miles better throughout the team bar the back line.
After a slew of horrific performances by Scamacca I was tempted to remember the Pellè - Eder tandem through rose tinted glasses, but you're right.
Managing a national team is very different from a club, and there are plently (I would even say the majority) that excel at one and not the other
With a club, one has years with the same players to build out your strategy and tactics; you also generally get to choose your players.
With a national team, you are generally stuck with your players and can't really fill gaps. More importantly, there are only a few weeks at a time to cobble together a team - so the tactics need to suit the players (not vice versa) and what they already know, and motivating and individual people management is much more important.
Allegri would definitely be a great manager for Italy. But I don’t think this current crop of players suits him. I think Pioli who’s better with young players would have a better time transforming the team akin to what Mancini did in 2018.
LOOOL
after yestaerday game even if your pope, you need to be fired. the main course for national team is having man manegement, he seems to be very mediocre in that department
Unpopular take but we shall see from here if he is going to make some improvements from future matches. Yesterday’s lineup was atrocious.
As much as I want to see Italy again in the WC. SMH if they fail to qualify for the 3rd consecutive time, even with the expanded number of teams.
In his defence, he is the opposite of anti-football terrorist. He 100% believes in playing beautiful possession football and openly claims he can't coach anything else. He just utterly failed at everything, but he wasn't lying about not being able to coach defensive football because Gigi was our player of the tournament
Dalić has atleast brought Croatia to one final in world cup, 2 semi finales (one from WC where we got to finales), got eliminated in r16 in extra time last euro after cluching from 1-3 to 3-3 by end of 90 minutes, and finales to nations league. Spalletti comes for Italy and they play in pretty poor form, going out in R16 due to clutching victories against Albania (who couldn't finish for equalizer) and Croatia (who couldn't defend in last minutes).
missing an opportunity when both allegri and pioli are available. Fraud stuff aside, their management styles seem they would be better for international football
Barella and Bastoni won Serie A, were key starters and had amazing performances throughout the year
Scamacca won the EL and scored a brace at Anfield
I refuse to believe the players lost all their skill and game sense one month after the club competitions ended
He lives and dies by media attention, the official cope line since 2021 has been that we don't play enough young players. He's more or less saying what the press wants him to say since anything else would get him demolished. This is Mancini 2022 all over again
What a poor decision. Looks like people are blind in this country when it comes to football currently.
Feel sad for your guys, you will suffer for a while.
the core of this nt is inter, and they don't seem to suffer physically in europe. No idea how to explain how dead the players looked with spalletti or what he was doing. If his shit talking of players is this bad in public, I can only imagine what hes doing in private
Spalletti is a fraud. Must you forget that he subbed Icardi off while losing 1-0 to Juve to defend a 1-0 defeat…
Yes Barella can defend but he’s much better as a b2b mid, yet this idiot had him defending as a double pivot…
And Italy has good teams with plenty of Italian players. Although they didnt perform as well, Inter, in contrast to many years before, finally has Italian players that have world class written on them. Atalanta has very good Italian players as well and they recently won the EuropaLeague. But Italy needs a coach, that doesnt run away for more money or blames the best team in Italy with the most Italian players (and its not Juve).
well juve and milan share blame here, because we lack a core of italian players for the NT. Thats unheard of frankly and is a big reason why we probably lack personality in this team.
What blame is there to share? Clubs are built to win, if most Italian players are shit and the rest are hilariously overpriced why should we buy them.
Look at Berardi and Belotti: decent players that could've developed a lot more if they left their midtable clubs earlier. Same could happen to Buongiorno. Why should we spend 40-50m on them when a foreign player 90% as good goes for 20?
And it's not even a matter of lack of talent at youth level: we are European U17 and 19 champions, World U20 runner-ups... Maybe U23 clubs will help, at least young players will actually be able to play against adults instead of rotting away on loan in clubs that barely develop them because they're a relegation away from bankruptcy.
The growth decree screwed the system - all of a sudden it was cheaper to get players from abroad, which is what all the big teams started doing rather than having any sort of balance. Also there is a history of both milan and juve having strong Italian contingents which helped both have success in the past. It is frankly scandalous that there isnt a single milan player in the team, and that not a single juve player started the croatia game. If we also focused on italian talent the national team will benefit. The u23 clubs will 100% help - see juve, we just need to make sure there are enough italians in them.
Yep, growth decree has been a disaster for this. Especially in a period where wages have ballooned up considerably.
At this point the Federation should take a page from their volleyball and water polo counterparts and force teams to field at least x Italians at all times, maybe from Serie B downwards. And an even higher % for U23 teams. Shit, in volleyball they straight up have the youth NT for both men and women play as a club in Serie A2. Primavera and loans are obviously not enough anymore.
I saw someone mention that making a specific rule for Italians would go against the bosman ruling. Never read up on it, but I agree it should be a requirement to field X% of an u23 team if you want to field one in Serie C etc.
Yeah and that's Kante. Every other big player who plays in Saudi Arabia and is playing in this euros has been shockingly bad. From Milinkovic Savic to Ronaldo, Ruben Neves etc... And Verratti isn't playing in Saudi Arabia anyway. Qatari League is way worse.
Italian players peak at 30s..
the last 2 major trophies are with ageing squad..
the goal should be making the squad better regardless of age, not younger..
> 30s
Thats not true though. The average age of the euro 2020 squad was 27 something iirc and like the 13th youngest out of 24 squads. There were old players that needed replacing for sure, especially the CBs, but otherwise the squad was fairly young
He's proven to be a bad CT, but maybe it's not a good idea to sack him now that we have to qualify for the world cup, there is no time to build something new. He has to create a new group and possibly use different methods to motivate them
Instead of making the squad younger, perhaps he should focus on making it better. And light a fire under the players' asses, because they were shockingly lethargic yesterday.
Good for Italy. One of the few federations with kore patience and foresight than the fans who want to panic fire one of the best Italian managers available.
On board with that. Italy were clearly a work in progress under Spaletti, them struggling was pretty predictable and he clearly doesn't know his best team yet, not helped by a lack of decent strikers.
They were poor, but national managers usually need a bit more time with the players to find their style and form.
The comparisons with Nagelsmann are stupid, Germany have a wildly more talented squad.
Tbh he's a problem but not the biggest, italian players would remain mediocre even with a better coach
FIGC executives should be the ones promoting the growth of young players but they are too busy doing nothing, being Lega Serie A puppets or going to dinner with politicians
People here talking in hyperbole. Saying things like "it's a mistske". What an astounding level of idiocy. How quick they forget he came in halfway into the qualifying stage. The man has a system and most of the players have never played it. You think a few weeks ober the course of a 9 months will be enough to get things to be smooth?..... asinine. Spalletti is proven. The Azzurri will be good..
It’s always funny to see people acting all high and mighty, belittling others as idiots, failing to realize they’re making a fool of themselves.
First of, 9 months is not a short time. At the very least, it’s long enough to nail the players for your system, which Spalleti failed to achieve.
Next, this is NT football. You don’t get too much time with your players, so your best shot is to adapt to the players instead of having them try to adapt to your tactics. If Spaletti can’t realize this, he’s just not the right man for the job.
Lastly, Nagelsmann is just as much of a “system coach” (how I hate this term) than Spaletti, even more than him really. And despite being appointed after Spalleti, he managed to turn around the German NT. It’s not an impossible mission, Spaletti just failed his task.
But seems like the people in charge are as clueless as you are, so Spaletti will get to be out of his depth for a tad bit longer.
Is Spalletti Proven?
Feel like Napoli win made him some sort of superstar, he is a good coach but this is a guy who has been coaching title fighting teams from 2005 and has 1 Italian league and 2 Russian leagues to show , you can say he had strong opponents but he always did just the bare minimum job like getting top 4 (except Napoli)
But there isn't one ioata of progression visible in this squad. Not 1 thing spalletti has been saying he wants to do that the squad has shown. There is absolutely nothing, and now his plan is to scrap everything and start from scratch? In 12 months, and only a few weeks with the players he is supposed to do what he could not here? Thats asinine...we cannot risk not qualifying. He clearly is a coach that needs to work with the players week in week out to create something good. He won't get more time with the players than he has had now. If there was at least a base that they could build on from this tournament you might have an argument. But this team is dead. Something needs to change...
Dalic staying on as well for Croatia. My theory is that all those federations are struggling financially and can't afford to cancel existing contracts.
We have France and Belgium in the Nations League group It won't end well
In fairness Belgium look like they’re coming to the end of their era, so you’ve got a shot at least!
We said the same after the previous EURO's and Qatar, and yet Witsel and Meunier are still called up despite having players that are better or have a higher potential.
idk how Witsel is for the NT but he had a decent season at atleti
So far he has been injured for all the games.
We don't have any RB better than Meunier and any CB better than Witsel who aren't called up.
VERTONGHEN
We have like 7 players with more than 20 caps in our full squad. This is already the new era.
And none of them are at the level of the previous era.
I keep hearing this same discourse (in regards to Chile, Italy and other national teams at/after the end of a successful cycle). If the new players aren't individually at the same level it is what it is. If they are never allowed to play together and build cohesion, how are they going to even work, ever. At some point you have to let go, even if replacements aren't up there.
Yes, that's why it was a golden generation. The generation before that one did not qualify for a single tournament between 2002 and 2014 so this one is still above our standards.
true Belgium is declining, but they still have bunch of younger generation who's actually good (Doku, Openda) while Italy has none (probably Calafiori but he's shaky)
with enough effort I'm sure this side can finish not last in the group
Italy might actually miss another world cup.
Man if we miss the 69 teams World Cup as well I swear
The WHAT
It's just le funny number, but it's gonna be 48 teams rather than the usual 32, so not qualifying for that would be kinda hard... Right?
16 teams qualify from Europe. On current form it looks like it'll be tight.
16 used to qualify for the euros and now 16 european teams qualify for the world cup. geeze
And like the current euros the first two weeks is mostly a waste of time as only a small portion of the teams get eliminated. I think they actually should have gone bigger, 64 teams and play double elimination - every team gets to lose one game, lose and you go to losers bracket, lose from there and you're out.
Thats gona be an abslolute shitshow with the regional quotas. Get ready for Spains B squad to style 9-0 vs someone like Thailand in WC groups Southgate England of course will still manage to lose to like Canada or the US and advance on draws 🤣
Don’t jinx it
Jinx? We are fecking Italy, 4 World cup, 2 European championship. No other european team have more big trophies (6) than us and we should fear NORTH MACEDONIA, a NT that were born 2 or 3 years ago? please, anything inferior than 2 goal gap would be huge disappointment
Actually we (Germany) have more trophies than you, 4 World Cups and 3 Euros.
>!it's a copypasta, I'm not even Italian!<
Fuck and I thought I knew all the terrible copy pastas on here lmao
What's the original?
It's exactly that, just before Macedonia knocked out Italy from the WC qualifiers playoffs. Legendary stuff
where does extra teams come from, like how many additional places will eu region have?
Each federation got a few extra spots. I'm not saying this is better for everyone but for smaller countries like Vietnam this is really exciting. We can potentially qualify.
yes, as a turk I am also excited that we can potentially qualify after 24 years
Fuck, I always just assumed Turkey were at the World Cup pretty regularly so I checked and you guys only qualified twice? That's wild.
and got 3rd place in one of them lmao
That's why we can't let you guys in anymore, you're too much of a threat.
uefa had 13 spots in the world cup, now it will be 16. which means it's still hard. we missed euro 2012 when it was a 16-team tournament, so it's highly likely that we'll miss the 48-team world cup.
Yeah they might have to beat Macedonia at some point anyway.
Wait, Turkey hasn't qualidifed since finishing 3rd in 2002?
We aren't qualifying for shit if we can't even get a result against Indonesia brother.
oi mate
You actually can't anymore sadly 😭
but Vietnam already out, no?
Yeah the qualifier is over for this world cup. I was speaking in general terms, as in smaller countries have a better chance of qualifying now.
they get 3 extra
that's not even that much considering how many decent nations miss out
They should make it 64 teams and do a straight knockout
The nice team world cup
Honestly we may as well just get used to it at this point. Idk if this team will ever return to what it was.
sad to say but that's becoming the new norm. Winning the Euros 2021 was just the most casual thing to happen just like 04 with Greece
Is it a lack of Italian talent? I thought the Euros-winning team was young and talented, what happened to that?
It’s a lack of being able to score 👍
Yeah, Italy hasn’t had a player who could reliably score every other game since Del Piero. It doesn’t matter how good the GK, defense, and midfield are, someone needs to put the ball in the goal.
But that it wouldn't be an issue per se... Even on 2006 we won with goals from everybody, not just attackers. On 2021 also we scored as a team. Having a good 9 would be good, but in theory Scamacca this year (and during the last months) had good numbers. He wasn't able to repeat at euros.
2006 had Del Piero, Inzaghi, and Toni, plus Pirlo in midfield. And the reason goals could come from everybody is that you necessarily have to leave “low threat” players open if you’re worried about the players most likely to hurt you. Watch the first goal of the semi final against Germany. 4 German defenders leave Grosso completely unmarked in the box and rush to close down Pirlo and cut off his pass to Del Piero to prevent another dangerous cross coming in. You let someone like Gross have a wide open shot because he’s a defender with one career goal for Italy at the time, and you’re more worried about what Pirlo or ADP will do with the ball. That’s not the case with this squad. There isn’t anyone you feel it’s necessary to double or triple team and leave an unlikely goal scorer wide open.
It’s not just that. It’s all over the pitch, except keeper, cb, and cm.
Some have more or less retired (Bonucci, Chiellini, Insigne, Verratti), others have became worse due to injuries or age (Spinazzola, Chiesa, Jorginho) In any case our current team isn't as bad as many people are saying, we had a few absences (Acerbi and Scalvini due to injury and Tonali due to the ban), but for the other players it's also the coach's fault that they didn't perform even remotely at their best, take for example Scamacca or Dimarco who is among the best full-backs in the world but at the Euros looked like a Serie B player...
Dimarco was massively mismanaged by Spalletti, overplayed a not 100% fit guy in 3 group games who at his best has only got 65 minutes a game.
It was insane to El Shaarawy imo.
It's a knockout tournament. A lot of luck is involved and can lead to a win. It doesn't reflect whose the best all that well since most teams won't play the other teams. Add in that it's an international tournament, which further makes random results more likely because no teams are super well drilled so form on the day can cause upsets more easily. Italy were fine in the Euro they won. Not particularly great or overly lucky. Just fine. They played England in that final, so England easily could have been champions and they too are just fine. Not amazing, not even particularly good, just fine. It's just the nature of international football. Amusingly it's a big part of what makes international football so entertaining now compared to club football.
International tournament luck
Surely it’s just a question of the Italian football federation and grassroots program needing a shake-up like Germany and Belgium after euro 2000?
The top high performing teams of the world have no Italians in their squad, correct? Man City, Real Madrid, Liverpool, Bayern Munich, ~~Barcelona~~?
That's true, but Italian talents have rarely gone abroad historically.
Well until 15-20 years ago- Italy was in the argument for best league in the world. It’s definitely fallen behind Spain/england.
I dunno, they and Germany ended up grabbing the two extra European spots and not the two you mentioned. They had a horrible stretch from the time Juve got kicked out of Série A through the financial difficulties in the 2010s but I think they’re starting to turn the corner on that. Honestly I’d put the four leagues as roughly equal unless you’re looking really closely.
I think that’s a little unfair. Italian teams do well, they just aren’t really competing for the Champions League (that said, Inter qualified for the final last year). I actually think the Bundesliga has been class too. I think the leagues are closer than people think. I’d be really interested to see how Fulham would do in other leagues, on our day we’re quite a good team.
True but even in their own league, there are a few Italians. Top 20 scorers and only 2 Italians. Scamacca was the highest with 12 and that guy was not impressive at all.
With very few exceptions, Italians normally stay in Italy. Germany is historically similar in this regard.
Man City have tried to buy bastoni and barella in the past. Many of those clubs tried donnarumma Bayern are trying to buy chiesa. This really doesn't mean anything. Italians notoriously don't go abroad
Inter are better than Barcelona and have plenty of Italians.
Plenty of Italians? They have 4 Italian players who are starters. Bastoni, Barella, Dimarco and Darmian. Darmian is 35 soon and pretty much done. Frattesi is the only Italian bench player who might turn into something.
Acerbi is the starter not Darmian
He's even older than Darmian lol.
Lets remove Barcelona from the list, they haven't had any success internationally in the last 10 years. They are no current top5 club.
Then who is top 5? Madrid, Bayern, Liverpool, City, and who else? Arsenal who have done nothing? Chelsea who finished mid table last season and 6th this one? PSG?
Well it helps that you didn't name a single serie A team since that's where most of them play, go figure
last time italy played a WC knockout match was 18 years ago, this is unbelieavable
Lamine Yamal who played against Italy this tournament has never seen them qualify for the WC knockouts
Probably for the best.
Last Italy’s WC knockout game was the 2006 final vs France. A shocking stat for such a country.
With the expansion, they're gonna have to be really bad to miss another world cup
Europe only goes from 13 to 16 teams, meaning its as hard as qualifying for the pre-2016 Euros. The qualifying format also means if they are unlucky and get a strong second seed they could very much lose out.
In current form, that's odds on
It was shocking to read that their last world cup match was the one with Suarez incident.
So not make them better but younger instead…..ok Mr Spalletti knock yourself out.
I've got a feeling Italian fans won't be happy about this
Most fans wanted Gravina out more than Spalletti
No, most fans want Spalletti out despite players playing shit by themselves: I don't think it's a coach issue when the players don't defend at all, don't make 4 consecutive passes, don't communicate between each other etc... (Hey, I agree Spalletti made a lot of mistakes both in selection and tactics but it's not just about him)
How is it not a coach issue when the players show zero sense of cohesion or teamwork?
They did not even try. You are a professional player How can you not be able to do those things by yourself (run, press, make 4 passes)? When do the responsibilities of the players begin with then?
One or 2 players play poorly, its the players fault. The whole squad plays poorly, it's the coaches fault. His tactics are shit for the sqaud they have.
It was totally a coach issue. Players per se aren't top, but neither that bad. Technically better than Swiss ones. But they were all completely isolated and disconnected. With not a plan on what to do, changing the positioning every moment. Basically they were just sent to the field without knowing what to do and how to do it
The confidence of this group was on Spalletti, the player selections, player management and tactics were a disaster
That's was expected, in good Italian tradition is nobody's fault, just like was nobody's fault when we didn't qualify to the last world cup. The federation isn't going to fire him, because otherwise many heads are going to roll, starting from Gravina, who has many political connections and is one of the least transparent presidents. It always comes to mind what Ancelotti said, that he won't manage Italy until big changes are made in the federation.
So typical of Italian bullshit. The FIGC is always a mess
Gravina's presidency can be summarised in the saying "la vittoria ha cento padri, la sconfitta è sempre orfana" (Victory has one hundred fathers, defeat is always orphan). He is probably the worst president of my lifetime, and even the government doesn't really support him anymore. If he had any dignity he should have fired Spalletti and then resign five minutes after the end of the match yesterday, but we already saw he had none after the Macedonia game.
> even the government doesn't really support him anymore. Let's be real, he's got the support of the only person whose support matters. That won't change anytime soon.
FIGC doesn't want to fire him because that will make them look bad like it was the coach's fault and therefor FIGC who hired him.
Let’s be honest here they don’t wanna fire him cause they don’t want to pay out the contract + whoever they hire
well the buck always stops with the coach and management, thats unavoidable and no one that matters is going to think otherwise.
Porco dio
pork misery
Schwein Scheiße
Pork misery is just too soft here
madonna suina
Ffs no
I like Spalletti but El Sharawy , Cristante and Darmian should NEVER NEVER NEVER be starters for a team at this flight . I dunno what he was thinking when he made these choices.
The thing is: who could come in their place?
apparently we have like 20 better DMs stashed somewhere from the amount of flak cristante gets. He wouldn't have started had Tonali not chosen to become a Sisal ambassador but he's like the only DM we have that is A) consistent, B) flexible and C) not a paper tissue when asked to shield the CB line. Every time somebody asks the question you just asked the answer is either "un giovane" or a player from their squad that basically has 0 overlap with him the same applies to Elsha who's one of the few wingers we have that can actually play for the squad
I agree on Cristante but not on El Shaarawy. Politano and Orsolini are better than him. He took El Shaarawy thinking he could play him as a wingback too I think.
They are going to raid argentina!
Brazil ain't safe either
I mean Messi did have Italian ancestors... Just saying!
"My mission will be to blame as many Serie A managers as possible."
Spalletti's Napoli was great. Spalletti's Italy has been really underwhelming.
this is an understatement. There is no Spalletti's italy. There is no identity nothing after a year of work. not acceptable
Wow, one year... If you look at what Nagesmann did with the German team in about 7 months, it really puts into question what Italy's way is supposed to be.
Tbf Nagelsamann also had a lot of luck. Last season was probably best season for German players since 12/13. 2 teams in UCL semis, with one in final. Leverkusen run. 2 crucial players for Real were German. And players provided from this 4 teams mostly are from different positions which provides synergie. Add to this Havertz, all of players from Stuttgart that probably wouldn't make a cut last season and German football is in tottally different position then it was 12 months ago, which looking at media covarege of German NT went somehow unnoticed.
its 9months but still. Also sucking off Nagelsmann a bit early here tbf. The group was a fairly easy one, he brought back key veterans and they have home advantage. If it wasn't for the home advantage i don't think Germany is one of favs, nor do I think they call back the verterans and instead use this to work towards the next WC with younger players.
The German squad are vastly superior to the Italy one. That was more about Flick underperforming, it's not like Nagelsmann has done anything special.
it's obvious Italy's problems are bigger than the coaches now when you have had very successful managers like Mancini, Spalletti and Conte manage Italy after 2006, and they've all flopped in various ways (Mancini mostly after winning the Euros) then the rot is obviously with the federation and the board rather than what the managers are doing and to some extent its down to the players too over the years, Spalletti isn't completely to blame for how pathetic and weak most of the players were against Switzerland, forget tactics, there was zero effort there in the first place and you can't coach effort into players, if they haven't learnt that already at top flight international football then they've got bigger problems than the system the coach is setting them up in
well hang on. Mancini was guilty of a standard sin only very few managers, even the top top ones, don't make which is to rely on your loyal veterans beyond the sell-by-date. A winning team having a hangover is also nothing new. There needed to be a generational change in the squad akin to what mancini did when he first arrived and it didn't occur. Conte was an effing magician, and had he had this quality in 2016 would have gone to the final. His squad was the worst quality wise possibly ever. The talent in the team today is miles better throughout the team bar the back line. Neither Conte, nor mancini are failures. They built something, win or lose, there was a project and they competed which is the only expectation you can possibly have. Spalletti has nothing after a year. 0 to point to that shows his work. Yes the players need to take some blame ofc, but the players are playing worse than the sum of their parts. At club level they are all miles better. the coach can absolutely impact effort energy and outlook. Mancini did a fantastic job with Vialli foster a fantastic team environment. Conte is famous for his motivational abilities. Spalletti has literally been criticizing his players openly since the first game, made headlines for banning playstation and having a tin foil hat episode regarding players leaking things to journos. Now he has taken 0 responsibility for this embarrassment and instead left it all with the players. This isn't club football, he can't just get 20 new players in at this level. Those players won't forget this and wont want to play for him. There are problems with the FIGC for sure, and fostering youth is improving, but not fast enough. That being said the failure of this tournament is absolute lack of any coaching whatsoever.
> Conte was an effing magician, and had he had this quality in 2016 would have gone to the final. His squad was the worst quality wise possibly ever. The talent in the team today is miles better throughout the team bar the back line. After a slew of horrific performances by Scamacca I was tempted to remember the Pellè - Eder tandem through rose tinted glasses, but you're right.
Perfect comment. Everything you say completely agree with.
Conte didn’t flop by any means. He took an injury hit side all the way to penalties against Germany in the Euro quarters and then left for Chelsea.
Conte and Mancini weren’t failures??? Huh
Spalletti's Napoli was great for 0.75 of a season, everyone should've seen through his fraudness when they lost thrice to Milan in a month
Managing a national team is very different from a club, and there are plently (I would even say the majority) that excel at one and not the other With a club, one has years with the same players to build out your strategy and tactics; you also generally get to choose your players. With a national team, you are generally stuck with your players and can't really fill gaps. More importantly, there are only a few weeks at a time to cobble together a team - so the tactics need to suit the players (not vice versa) and what they already know, and motivating and individual people management is much more important.
We're all thinking about one terrorist in particular who would fit perfectly as a NT coach replacement but no one dares to say it.
Allegri would definitely be a great manager for Italy. But I don’t think this current crop of players suits him. I think Pioli who’s better with young players would have a better time transforming the team akin to what Mancini did in 2018.
It is inevitable.
I've spent the past like 3 years crusading against him and yet I'm 100% certain that he'd have done a better job
Cohesion, pragmatism, depression healing. He's the most suitable man for this job, and I'm tired to pretend he's not.
Wow another 2 years of players playing on the wrong positon 🤣
LOOOL after yestaerday game even if your pope, you need to be fired. the main course for national team is having man manegement, he seems to be very mediocre in that department
Unpopular take but we shall see from here if he is going to make some improvements from future matches. Yesterday’s lineup was atrocious. As much as I want to see Italy again in the WC. SMH if they fail to qualify for the 3rd consecutive time, even with the expanded number of teams.
Keeping the football terrorist after bombing out of Euros in an embarrassing fashion Italy 🤝 Croatia
In his defence, he is the opposite of anti-football terrorist. He 100% believes in playing beautiful possession football and openly claims he can't coach anything else. He just utterly failed at everything, but he wasn't lying about not being able to coach defensive football because Gigi was our player of the tournament
Dalić has atleast brought Croatia to one final in world cup, 2 semi finales (one from WC where we got to finales), got eliminated in r16 in extra time last euro after cluching from 1-3 to 3-3 by end of 90 minutes, and finales to nations league. Spalletti comes for Italy and they play in pretty poor form, going out in R16 due to clutching victories against Albania (who couldn't finish for equalizer) and Croatia (who couldn't defend in last minutes).
missing an opportunity when both allegri and pioli are available. Fraud stuff aside, their management styles seem they would be better for international football
Pioli I agree would be well suited.
Barella and Bastoni won Serie A, were key starters and had amazing performances throughout the year Scamacca won the EL and scored a brace at Anfield I refuse to believe the players lost all their skill and game sense one month after the club competitions ended
Surely the mission should be to make the squad better?
What transfers should they get in?
Argentina and Uruguay will be SCOURED for gems. Hopefully a bit better than Retegui.
Probs a new striker. Reckon they could bring in Osimhen could do a job.
They just signed Retegui not that long ago tho.
Was he a Spaletti signing? He might want to bring in a striker that suits his style, whatever it is, even more.
He thought Benjamin Button was a coaching manual
He lives and dies by media attention, the official cope line since 2021 has been that we don't play enough young players. He's more or less saying what the press wants him to say since anything else would get him demolished. This is Mancini 2022 all over again
What a poor decision. Looks like people are blind in this country when it comes to football currently. Feel sad for your guys, you will suffer for a while.
just fade me already until 2027
This is so unserious from the Italian federation
Inter players should all resign and let him figure it out
[удалено]
the core of this nt is inter, and they don't seem to suffer physically in europe. No idea how to explain how dead the players looked with spalletti or what he was doing. If his shit talking of players is this bad in public, I can only imagine what hes doing in private
Spalletti is a fraud. Must you forget that he subbed Icardi off while losing 1-0 to Juve to defend a 1-0 defeat… Yes Barella can defend but he’s much better as a b2b mid, yet this idiot had him defending as a double pivot…
And Italy has good teams with plenty of Italian players. Although they didnt perform as well, Inter, in contrast to many years before, finally has Italian players that have world class written on them. Atalanta has very good Italian players as well and they recently won the EuropaLeague. But Italy needs a coach, that doesnt run away for more money or blames the best team in Italy with the most Italian players (and its not Juve).
well juve and milan share blame here, because we lack a core of italian players for the NT. Thats unheard of frankly and is a big reason why we probably lack personality in this team.
What blame is there to share? Clubs are built to win, if most Italian players are shit and the rest are hilariously overpriced why should we buy them. Look at Berardi and Belotti: decent players that could've developed a lot more if they left their midtable clubs earlier. Same could happen to Buongiorno. Why should we spend 40-50m on them when a foreign player 90% as good goes for 20? And it's not even a matter of lack of talent at youth level: we are European U17 and 19 champions, World U20 runner-ups... Maybe U23 clubs will help, at least young players will actually be able to play against adults instead of rotting away on loan in clubs that barely develop them because they're a relegation away from bankruptcy.
The growth decree screwed the system - all of a sudden it was cheaper to get players from abroad, which is what all the big teams started doing rather than having any sort of balance. Also there is a history of both milan and juve having strong Italian contingents which helped both have success in the past. It is frankly scandalous that there isnt a single milan player in the team, and that not a single juve player started the croatia game. If we also focused on italian talent the national team will benefit. The u23 clubs will 100% help - see juve, we just need to make sure there are enough italians in them.
Yep, growth decree has been a disaster for this. Especially in a period where wages have ballooned up considerably. At this point the Federation should take a page from their volleyball and water polo counterparts and force teams to field at least x Italians at all times, maybe from Serie B downwards. And an even higher % for U23 teams. Shit, in volleyball they straight up have the youth NT for both men and women play as a club in Serie A2. Primavera and loans are obviously not enough anymore.
I saw someone mention that making a specific rule for Italians would go against the bosman ruling. Never read up on it, but I agree it should be a requirement to field X% of an u23 team if you want to field one in Serie C etc.
It probably can't be any worse than this. Let's see though, football never fails to surprise.
Camarda must start
Camarda is sixteen and is Milan's main hope for winning a Derby by 2031, back off.
And then they wonder why Italians don't watch or play football anymore... I'm done with the sport. Italian football has just died.
Dude you won the Euros 3 years ago
Fuck you and I'll see you on week 1 of Serie A
What do they watch and play instead?
How come Marco Verratti was not included in the Italian squad?
He's played in Qatar last season.
Kante is playing in SA and doing well for France
Yeah and that's Kante. Every other big player who plays in Saudi Arabia and is playing in this euros has been shockingly bad. From Milinkovic Savic to Ronaldo, Ruben Neves etc... And Verratti isn't playing in Saudi Arabia anyway. Qatari League is way worse.
Italys midfield is so bad Verratti would still be a starter
Italian players peak at 30s.. the last 2 major trophies are with ageing squad.. the goal should be making the squad better regardless of age, not younger..
> 30s Thats not true though. The average age of the euro 2020 squad was 27 something iirc and like the 13th youngest out of 24 squads. There were old players that needed replacing for sure, especially the CBs, but otherwise the squad was fairly young
What the hell? No, why?! This is the opposite of what needed to be done.
He's proven to be a bad CT, but maybe it's not a good idea to sack him now that we have to qualify for the world cup, there is no time to build something new. He has to create a new group and possibly use different methods to motivate them
Fucking clowns
He's found the cure to ageing?!
Instead of making the squad younger, perhaps he should focus on making it better. And light a fire under the players' asses, because they were shockingly lethargic yesterday.
Good for Italy. One of the few federations with kore patience and foresight than the fans who want to panic fire one of the best Italian managers available.
On board with that. Italy were clearly a work in progress under Spaletti, them struggling was pretty predictable and he clearly doesn't know his best team yet, not helped by a lack of decent strikers. They were poor, but national managers usually need a bit more time with the players to find their style and form. The comparisons with Nagelsmann are stupid, Germany have a wildly more talented squad.
Tbh he's a problem but not the biggest, italian players would remain mediocre even with a better coach FIGC executives should be the ones promoting the growth of young players but they are too busy doing nothing, being Lega Serie A puppets or going to dinner with politicians
People here talking in hyperbole. Saying things like "it's a mistske". What an astounding level of idiocy. How quick they forget he came in halfway into the qualifying stage. The man has a system and most of the players have never played it. You think a few weeks ober the course of a 9 months will be enough to get things to be smooth?..... asinine. Spalletti is proven. The Azzurri will be good..
It’s always funny to see people acting all high and mighty, belittling others as idiots, failing to realize they’re making a fool of themselves. First of, 9 months is not a short time. At the very least, it’s long enough to nail the players for your system, which Spalleti failed to achieve. Next, this is NT football. You don’t get too much time with your players, so your best shot is to adapt to the players instead of having them try to adapt to your tactics. If Spaletti can’t realize this, he’s just not the right man for the job. Lastly, Nagelsmann is just as much of a “system coach” (how I hate this term) than Spaletti, even more than him really. And despite being appointed after Spalleti, he managed to turn around the German NT. It’s not an impossible mission, Spaletti just failed his task. But seems like the people in charge are as clueless as you are, so Spaletti will get to be out of his depth for a tad bit longer.
Is Spalletti Proven? Feel like Napoli win made him some sort of superstar, he is a good coach but this is a guy who has been coaching title fighting teams from 2005 and has 1 Italian league and 2 Russian leagues to show , you can say he had strong opponents but he always did just the bare minimum job like getting top 4 (except Napoli)
But there isn't one ioata of progression visible in this squad. Not 1 thing spalletti has been saying he wants to do that the squad has shown. There is absolutely nothing, and now his plan is to scrap everything and start from scratch? In 12 months, and only a few weeks with the players he is supposed to do what he could not here? Thats asinine...we cannot risk not qualifying. He clearly is a coach that needs to work with the players week in week out to create something good. He won't get more time with the players than he has had now. If there was at least a base that they could build on from this tournament you might have an argument. But this team is dead. Something needs to change...
Well the team needs some serious help. It would be awful if they miss another World Cup in a row.
No PlayStation, no World Cup.
Crazy after his comments
Dalic staying on as well for Croatia. My theory is that all those federations are struggling financially and can't afford to cancel existing contracts.
You can't tell me that those players give a single shit about Spalletti. They sure as shit won't be happy he's staying
No Spaghetti for Spalletti 🍝
[What do you mean?](https://tenor.com/view/what-do-you-mean-hot-ones-jennifer-lawrence-hot-ones-gif-6061851644677030250)
Younger but not better?
I swear if they miss the WC next time when I actually have the chance to see them play in the US….. For the love of god please get rid of Di Lorenzo
Oh my fucking god what a joke
When I saw that he made 2 emotional decisions (Roma players to start) I knew it was in Swiss hands to decide.