Building an Azzurri squad for 2022

Good points. Portugal and Italy have in many ways a similar mentality and can often play down to the level of weaker opponents. This has been the case for many years.

A lot will also depend on player selections and form between the two sides as March is a while away.

 

FIFA totally messed up the playoff format for UEFA. Instead of having a single pot 1 with 6 teams, it should've had pot 1A (top 3 seeds) and pot 1B (next 3 seeds). One team in 1A goes to each of the 3 brackets, which would've separated out Portugal, Italy, and Sweden into separate brackets. Idiotic thinking and it only weakens the World Cup. And I don't even think Portugal would be the tougher road game for Italy. Playing in Turkey would be a f***ing bear...that is a tough crowd and place to play. It actually might benefit Italy to play Portugal on the road because there will be a LOT of pressure to play well if they were at home, with the memory of the Sweden failure.

 

I meant favoured by the referee.

It will be a straight tie, whoever makes the final.

 

Does the winner of the Turkey Portugal semi-final match host the final or how does it work?

 

Ukraine isn't peaceful it has been fighting a civil war for years.

 

Mostly due to external provocations from Russia. It would be like if Germany tried to stir up separatist trouble in South Tyrol and other German-speaking parts of Northern Italy.

 

lol, its all Russia's fault? US state department had nothing to do with it? Hunter Biden must have earned that plum job on the Burisma board then?

 

No thanks. I'm not going to get into a dumb political argument here.

 

dumb is the only political argument libs are capable of

 

Didn't you used to be pretty left-wing?

 

I don't consider liberal left-wing

 

Oh okay. Not leftist enough for you.

Fine, whatever.

 

no, just not leftist.

Democrats are pro-war, pro-kids in cages, pro-Wall Street, pro-money in politics, pro-filibuster, pro-police, pro-big pharma, pro-censorship, pro-private prisons, anti-poor etc etc

They're not left, the US two-party system is a joke and the US is not a democracy.

 

oh and they dgaf about climate change

 

Don't you mean Austria ( not Germany ) ?

Austria shares the border with Sud Tirol .

 

Well, it's Austria. I couldn't really envision them giving a $hit. At least Germany has experience with that kind of thing.

 

So do the Austrians . The Anschluss was made easy due to their mutual sentiments at the time .

 

can never underestimate anybody

 

another Scamacca goal today vs Napoli.

Nice control and then with the power of Gigi Riva, volleys it home.

 

Yes, never underestimate an opponent.

It is becoming evident that Scamacca will be good enough to help navigate the playoffs, fitness permitting.

Sometimes the solution to problems was in front of you all the time, let's hope so!

 

bit concerned about throwing a kid into the deep end for the most high pressure fixture for the azzurri in years. Hopefully he can come on after we're in front against the Macedonians and score a confidence booster.

 

Belotti is almost certainly going to miss the March qualifiers. Scamacca > Raspadori means the former should be a back up for Immobile. I would give Immobile the first 45 against Macedonia and then bring in Scamacca at around the 60 minute. Give the youngster 30+ minutes and see how he does. If Italy win but neither forward looks impressive, then we go false 9 in the second game against Portugal/Turkey.

 

True. But it looks like Belotti will either still be out or just coming back. He probably won't be fit enough. Scamacca has the be Immobile's backup at this point. I have zero faith in Raspadori.

 

wonder what the fuss about Raspadori is... cos it's not as if he's scoring goals