Ailing Italy at new low after missing out on yet another World Cup

ROME – Italians will once again be forced to watch a World Cup from the sidelines after another play-off disaster highlighted just how far one of the great footballing nations has fallen.

Four-time world champions, the football-mad country finds itself at its lowest ebb and without a clear path to a brighter future after missing out again through the play-offs, this time following a penalty shoot-out defeat by Bosnia and Herzegovina in Zenica on March 31.

It started well for the Azzurri with Moise Kean opening the scoring on 15 minutes. But teammate Alessandro Bastoni was dismissed on 41 minutes and Bosnia eventually equalised via Haris Tabakovic 11 minutes before the end of normal time. With extra time unable to separate the sides, the hosts prevailed 4-1 in the shoot-out.

Gattuso the scapegoat?

Coach Gennaro Gattuso knew he had a tough job on his hands when he was appointed in June, asked to replace Luciano Spalletti and take Italy to the World Cup with automatic qualification looking near-impossible after a 3-0 hammering at the hands of Erling Haaland’s Norway.

One of the heroes of Italy’s 2006 World Cup triumph, Gattuso remained vague on his future as coach even as Gabriele Gravina, the head of Italy’s football federation (FIGC), asked him to stay beyond the end of his current contract which expires this summer.

Gattuso was a curious appointment given his spotty coaching career but Italy did not perform all that badly under him, with six wins from eight matches and 22 goals scored.

He has created a strong team spirit which was lacking under the volatile Spalletti, but another humbling defeat by Norway in November, 4-1 at the San Siro of all places, laid bare the limits of a team sorely missing the star power of years gone by.

And Gattuso could yet pay the price for his team’s failure, which came after being outplayed almost from the first minute by the exuberant Bosnians, as Gravina’s position at the head of the FIGC is not completely safe.

Gattuso told RAI: “It hurts, because we needed it for us, for all of Italy... We’re talking for the umpteenth time that we don’t go to the World Cup. I apologise if I didn’t make it, but the boys impressed me today.”

A board meeting next week will decide on whether Gravina, who was elected FIGC chief in 2018 after Carlo Tavecchio stepped down following Italy’s first World Cup play-off defeat by Sweden the previous year, will stay in place.

“We know that we’re in a profound crisis, a crisis that requires serious reflection and not only by the FIGC but also from politicians who have only pushed for resignations,” Gravina said.

Italy’s Sport Minister Andrea Abodi said on April 1 that Gravina should step down, noting: “It’s clear that Italian football needs to be rebuilt from the ground up and that starts with changes at the top of the FIGC.”

Twenty years of hurt

The 20th anniversary of Italy’s last World Cup win falls on July 9, during this summer’s Finals in the United States, Canada and Mexico.

But, if anything, that dramatic win on penalties over France feels even further away than that.

Tearful wing-back Leonardo Spinazzola summed it up, telling RAI: “Italian children will see another World Cup without Italy. I still can’t believe that we went out like this... it’s really a great disappointment for everyone.”

Faced with an empty summer, even Italy’s victory at Euro 2020 has been devalued as the country fails to produce world-class talent and its clubs, once the European elite, slip further behind their rivals, and above all the moneybags English Premier League.

Italy, whose European title defence ended at the last 16 in 2024 with a footballing lesson by Switzerland, have not played a knockout match at a World Cup since 2006; For context, the iPhone was introduced to the market one year later.

“Today’s results are the consequence of our attitude from 20 years ago, when we clung on to our best players like (Fabio) Cannavaro and (Francesco) Totti, thinking they would last forever,” said Gianluigi Buffon, another World Cup winner from 2006 involved with the national team.

“Right then we should have been rethinking our tactical and technical models.”

Grassroots reform

Too late to have any effect on the current senior team, the FIGC announced earlier in March a new project for youth football, led by long-term coach Maurizio Viscidi, who has had success with Italy’s national youth teams.

Cesare Prandelli, Italy coach for the dismal display at the 2014 World Cup, is now involved in the FIGC’s efforts to reform youth football after having criticised the way clubs coach the spontaneity out of young players.

“If 10 years ago we’d have had the good fortune to have a talent like Lamine Yamal, we would have let him get away,” he said in 2025. “Our coaches would have taken away his joy of playing.”

The new project announced on March 18 centres on offering training for coaches at a vast number of youth football clubs who train some 700,000 children.

Simone Perrotta, who reports to Viscidi, told AFP on March 30 that the aim is “to get the federation inside the clubs” and harmonise training methods in such a way as to encourage the development of individual skills and encourage invention.

Just 33 per cent of Serie A players are eligible for national team selection.

That number is higher than the 29.2 per cent of English players in the Premier League, while Germany (41.5 per cent) and France (37.5 per cent) both have a higher proportion of locals in top division squads. AFP, REUTERS