“In 2018, it was a shock. In 2022, we thought: it won’t happen again. It happened. This time, I wasn’t so sad, knowing that nobody does anything to change things,” an Italian friend told me after the fateful defeat to Bosnia in the World Cup playoffs.
“It’s a shame for the young people, my younger cousins who have never seen Italy play in a World Cup. But I think we deserved it.”
He summed it up well: if Italy missed out on the World Cup for the third time in a row, they only have themselves to blame.
We can debate reasons why the image of Fabio Cannavaro lifting the cup in 2006 has become a distant memory; why, in 2010 and 2014, the Azzurri didn’t even make it past the group stage.
Some will say that that great four-time champion team, with Buffon, Del Piero, Cannavaro, was the result of a model that no longer exists and that, today, more than two thirds of Serie A players are foreigners (this seems to me to be a simplistic and even prejudiced argument). That the lack of investment at the base limits the emergence of talent.
That clubs suffer because, playing in old stadiums, it is difficult to profit from commercial agreements. Italy will host the Euro Cup in 2032 with Turkey, but this is at risk because there are not a measly five stadiums at the standard required by UEFA.
Another Italian friend – loves football and understands the subject, just like the one mentioned above – didn’t even see his country face Bosnia because he had no hope of qualifying. “There’s also a bit of loss of national identity,” he told me.
“When you miss out on three, it’s been 12 years without playing. Italy winning the Euro Cup in 2021 was a miracle. We no longer have a Valentino Rossi, a Ferrari that wins, much of what we had as Italians. That national pride is missing.”
All valid. But the source of the problem could be off the field.
After the 2010 World Cup, when they finished last in the group with Paraguay, Slovakia and New Zealand, Arrigo Sacchi – coach of the finalist team in 1994 – was appointed by the Italian Federation as youth coordinator. Roberto Baggio, as president of the technical sector.
Sacchi pressured clubs to invest in young people. Baggio created a 900-page document called “Renewing the Future”, proposing reforms to the federation in talent development, training methods, etc. A year later, he resigned saying that the project was “literally dead”. Sacchi left the following year, citing stress and calling for self-criticism of Italian football.
“Everything Baggio did was thrown in the trash,” lamented my friend. “The biggest scandal is political. The federation remains the same, it doesn’t learn from its mistakes. The president wants to stay, show power, that’s why we remain in this situation.”
After the fiasco in 2018, the federation president resigned. His successor, Gabriele Gravina, continued in the position even with another failure in 2022. After the defeat to Bosnia, he waited days, but finally resigned.
Yes, Italian football needs a general reform. However, successive bad decisions in management and during the Qualifiers – with a team led by Gennaro Gattuso, champion in 2006, with no credibility as a coach – meant that Italy did not even qualify for a World Cup with 48 teams.
The request for self-criticism made by Sacchi 12 years ago remains valid and stronger than ever.
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