Fluke means an unlikely chance or occurrence. Italy and the Italian national team though can and does always produce players to field a national team that can beat Sweden. Its not like that team had a Zlatan lbrahimovic who was invincible. Heck all Ventura had to do was pick a top club from the Serie A using the same group of players and they will have won. I never believed a national team was that much better than most clubs and I still don't. If you want to stick with the all star combination, then that team especially should have included Fabio Quagliarella who was on the verge of scoring 19 goals at Sampdoria and was the top Italian goal scorer that season.
Immobile has been useless at this level. I would co-sign on that front 3. A mid of Verratti, Jorginho, and Barella. Off the bench, we would have Zaniolo, Belotti, Sensi, Pellegrini and one other natural #9. Throw in Sandro Tonali and those are your 12 in Mid/Attack.
Italy has good coaching this time. The players usually give 100 percent for the national team. Venture was the problem last time. I believe Italy will be playing some games at home. Italy can make a deep run in this upcoming tournament.
I agree I’d give your front 3 a look. However... unfair to lump Belotti with Immobile. Belotti has been good his last few games scoring a few goals... and even in games he doesn’t score.. his work rate is 100x better than that donkey immobile
Verratti yet again was garbage. Has there ever been an Italian player designated to take set pieces who has consistently proven themselves to be this inept. Such an all around disappointing performance from this team against a severely weakened shitty opponent. I sense that an important player was missing in the midfield. Someone who who could appeal to the creative minded sensibilities that most followers of Italian football are used to. A protagonist that could rise above the nonsense that the designated playmaker in the team failed to serve up. Sense when does Italy produce such uninspired tepid football? The sensible approach going forward will be to replace Verratti with a midfielder who can get the job done.
Mancini's new call ups for the next international break Me like Goalkeepers: Gianluigi Donnarumma (Milan), Pierluigi Gollini (Atalanta), Alex Meret (Napoli), Salvatore Sirigu (Torino) Defenders: Francesco Acerbi (Lazio), Cristiano Biraghi (Inter), Leonardo Bonucci (Juventus), Andrea Cistana (Brescia), Giovanni Di Lorenzo (Napoli), Emerson Palmieri (Chelsea), Alessandro Florenzi (Roma), Armando Izzo (Torino), Gianluca Mancini (Roma), Alessio Romagnoli (Milan), Leonardo Spinazzola (Roma) Midfielders: Nicolò Barella (Inter), Gaetano Castrovilli (Fiorentina), Jorginho (Chelsea), Rolando Mandragora (Udinese), Marco Verratti (Paris Saint-Germain), Nicolò Zaniolo (Roma) Forwards: Andrea Belotti (Torino), Domenico Berardi (Sassuolo), Federico Bernardeschi (Juventus), Federico Chiesa (Fiorentina), Stephan El Shaarawy (Shanghai Shenhua), Ciro Immobile (Lazio), Lorenzo Insigne (Napoli), Riccardo Orsolini (Bologna)
Really like the Orsolini inclusion. He gives Italy something different from the wing. I hope Mancini strongly considers bringing him to Euro 2020 as he could be useful there.
It's great to see an Italian coach pick all the right players for a change. The only omission worth noting is Tonali, but that has more to do with under 21 squad.
Nice to see Tonali, a 19 year old get a cap.... Tonali gets Italy nod as Verratti, Berardi, Spinazzola withdraw ...