After falling 1-0 to Sweden in an aggregate playoff match on November 13th, 2017, Italy’s international squad failed to qualify for the World Cup for the first time in 60 years. Immediately following Italy’s devastating loss, veterans Giorgio Chiellini, Andrea Barzagli, Daniele De Rossi and captain Gianluigi Buffon announced their retirement. All of a sudden, the roster became a lot younger.
For manager Gian Piero Ventura, who took over for Antonio Conte after Euro 2016, and finished with a record of 7-3-1 in World Cup qualifiers, finishing five points behind Spain, the winner of Group G, leading to the aggregate loss against Sweden; not qualifying for the World Cup with an elite lineup did not meet Italy’s high standards. Two days after the loss, Ventura was let go of his responsibility as Italy’s manager. A week after the loss, Carlo Tavecchio stepped down as president of the Italian Football Federation.
Following continuing struggles and more losses in friendly matches, in April of 2018, Italy dropped to 20th place on the FIFA world ranking list, their lowest spot. On May 14th, 2018, Roberto Mancini took over as the new manager.
Mancini took advantage of the youth on the roster. With Italy’s iconic 4-3-3 formation, he focused on having a strong, physical defence that limits shots and forces turnovers. He also focused on building a balanced midfield that consistently runs at an accelerated pace, helps force turnovers on defence to send the ball up the field to generate a strong counter-attack, which Italy has always been known for. Using their defensive physicality in the backfield and midfield to generate odd-man rushes, mismatches and scoring chances in opposing territory.
Under Mancini’s rule, before the 2020 Euro qualifiers, Italy won a friendly against Saudia Arabia by a score of 2-1 and then proceded to finish the UEFA nations league with a mere record of 1-2-1, finishing with 5 points. In this time, Mancini took time to develop chemistry with the players, build a reputation in the locker room. He developed a winning formula, the one above, and by the time the Euro qualifiers came around, he was ready to dominate.
And he did. Italy won all 10 games with Mancini as coach, scoring 37 goals, only surrendering 4. They finished first in Group J, 12 points ahead of Finland, the 2nd place team. They dominated possession time in every game, thanks to a strong defence, takeaways, excellent passing and ball control. Italy’s young defence and midfield played very well and controlled the game, helping dramatically improve goal production. Their young goalie, Gianluigi Donnarumma also had a stellar qualifiers. Italy qualified for the Euros after a 2-0 home win against Greece, with three matches left, but still played hard in the last 3 games, winning them all.
Italy became only the 6th team to qualify for a major European Championship with a 100% record, and have done it for the first time in their history.
One might say that Italy had an easy group which helped them finish 10-0-0. While Italy’s group had a few underwhelming teams like Lichenstein and Armenia, their group had a few strong teams like Finland, Greece and even Bosnia and Herzegovina, who exceeded their expectations. All groups were like that. Two or three powerhouses, one or two mediocre teams, and two or three inferior teams. Italy’s talent, youth and gameplans gave them their success.
Knowing this, they will be able to compete against any powerhouse in the upcoming tournament this coming summer, like France, Germany, Portugal, Spain, Croatia or England. A few teams are still playing qualifiers, and the groups for the Euros are yet to be made, but I do believe with Italy’s management and talent, they have a chance of winning their group; regardless of who they are in a group with and will definitely make it to the elimination round.
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