It was three, 1938 when FIFA promised to alternate the World Cup's between the continents and decided to host a consecutive one in Europe. In 1950 there was a dispute between AFA and CBF, and a last withdrawal in 1954 for a variety of internal and external reason. In 1970 it was a failure to qualify.
Xabi plays 3-5-2/3-4-2-1/3-1-3-3 and sometime 5-3-2. Palestra will probably play in front of Reece, or may even push Reece further up the side. With how badly Alonso wanted Palestra, I'm sure he's going to find a way to use him. Whoever becomes Italy's manager is probably best to stick to a 3 CB formation for now and work it out as your new guys are brought into the team. Just don't use Bastoni with Mancini. It doesn't work.
In both games they did retreat, but were forced to. They just retreated too far back because they just don't get it.
Norway was unlucky in that game. They dominated England even better than our necessary domination after going down a goal. Norway also dominated Brazil. They turned out to be a real deal team. Watching their game vs England, I always thought I'd rather face England.
Physicality should last all game, and a lot of physicality is psychological, in the mold of desire. England lost that when we had no choice but to attack them relentlessly. Those four watching Messi on the second goal after Mac Allister hit the post, had pain written all over their face. That was just before Messi ran around them. That is physicality failing, and it can easily fail when you have a psychological breakdown. I'm reminded of the look on the Brazilian players faces, most notably Maicon and Cesar after Germany got their second goal in 2014, they were shocked and then deflated.
That's true Im just trying to give them some credit but yes they shot their physicality bullet early and were the weaker team in the second half physically on top of technique.
It's easy for pundits to say that England lose because they choose to sit back. We have Croatia 2018, Italy 2021, Spain 2024 and now Argentina 2026. So England just choose to sit back? I think it's more than that.
Xabi played a 4 back at Real Madrid. If Chelsea played a 4 man, then I'd expect Xabi will too. If we wanted to stay with a 3 back, there is no better manager for us than Simeone Inzaghi imo. Or Gasperini. However, we want to get away from that. No national team is successful with a 3 back.
He didn't always. You have to use the players and their characteristics at their disposal. If it's just about playing a back four, then it should have also worked when Spaletti and Gattuso used a back four, and both of them did, but with the wrong players and that won't work out. You're going to need to discover the pieces, so in the meantime you use what you have at your disposal and I was pointing out that Xabi has used a variety of formations in his tenure at Leverkusen, and Madrid and should be able to find a way to bring in a talent like Palestra. This is especially true as he specifically asked for him. You'd hope he's going to find a way to use him, at least.
Haaland and Bellingham have been my preferred 2 players at this tournament. It really wouldn't have hurt if another England player gave 60 seconds of their time. https://youtube.com/shorts/7dl-t1bWfRQ?si=G6OTL6n4Fc06BDx9
Maurizio Mariani not appointed. The referee for the final has been appointed: it is going to be Slavko VinΔiΔ of Slovenia - the referee who had officiated at Argentina's defeat vs Saudi Arabia in 2022, as well as the Spain vs Italy group match and the Spain vs France semifinal at Euro 2024. The third place playoff will be officiated by JesΓΊs Valenzuela of Venezuela, who had previously officiated England vs USA and France vs Poland at the 2022 World Cup.
I hate to be the bearer of bad news but that list isn't totally accurate. Not entering a tournament isn't the same as not qualifying for one . Argentina only failed at qualifying once in 1970 ( losing the group to a very good Peru squad ) and as for the other 3 times they didnt enter or they boycotted. England has failed to qualify 3 times and they also have 3 non appearances due to non entry ( especially true I believe of those first 3 WCs in 1930 and 1934 and 1938 ) . The only times England failed at qualifying was in 1974 1978 and 1994 so not 3 consecutive. Ironically in 1978 it was because they lost the group to us ( Italy ) on purely goal difference alone . We beat them 2 - 0 in Rome and they did they same to us 2 - 0 at Wembley in 1978. The difference in the end was we had the final match ( to level the points at 10 with a win ) and beat Luxembourg 3 - 0 taking the group with 10 pts + 14 GD over England 10 pts + 11 GD. I'd have to take a closer look at those other nations to determine as to how those figures measure up to failing in qualification or failing to enter. But I can tell you for Argentina and England that was the case if my memory holds up here and I believe it does. Nevertheless after the record and all the trophies Gli Azzurri have amassed at WCs and Euros ( 4 WCs and 2 Euros ) its just not acceptable in the present day to fail at 3 straight qualifications and yes even if it was by the slimmest of margins and only down to one single goal ( 2018 and 2022 ) or pks ( 2026 ) . Not much consolation here. I seriously doubt you would ever see Spain ( in the post 2008 era ) fail at 3 straight qualifications campaigns. Even France after bagging their first WC win in 1998 haven't failed at qualification. There is no silver lining here. Italy failed in qualifying 4 times ( 1958 , 2018 , 2022 , 2026 boooo ) France 3 times ( 1962 , 1970 & 1994 Ginola shit the bed ) Uruguay 3 times ( 1978 , 1982 & 1994 ) Spain 2 times ( 1954 and 1958 ) Germany 2 times --->>> but not really---->>> ( 1930 declined open invitation and 1950 banned )
Yes but if we compare Italy to Italy this dark period of 2017-2026 is actually not as much as an outlier as it seems. We had a golden generation in the 1930s and then from 1949-1966 we had many disasters. We won Euro 68 made the 1970 final and won the world cup in 1982 but we were really bad in Euro Cups in 72/76/84. There are two ways to look at it yes there are more teams now that qualify for world cups but the small European teams were much weaker then and there were less of them with CzeckSlovakia Yugoslavia USSR. We did not come up against a Spain or Norway in a lot of years where we qualified but then had a disaster world cup if we did we likely would have missed more. It is an absolute disaster without doubt but for us it is not abnormal to have disasters between success. We went to the Euro 2012 final and won Euro 2020 (2021) that is a 9 year stretch. It's hard to explain how that can happen at the same time we missed 3 straight finals but that is Italy. Fans that experienced 1990-2006 sometimes mistakenly look back and see Italys past success and assume it was a straight line until 2017 but it was not. By 68 Italy were looked at as a fallen giant that rose again by 82 the idea of Italy winning a world cup was seen as unlikely as England winning. We somehow appear out of chaos and win and then sink back into disaster. It is a constant melodrama.
Italia is like The Epic Greek Tragedy of World Football. An anomaly of sorts . High peaks followed directly by abysmal lows. Forget about German consistency and efficiency in qualifying ( that is for the Germans ) . What else can be expected from the land that gave birth to Romance , the Renaissance , Opera and so much more? Its only fitting. Isn't it?
100000% exactly it. I did a deep dive on Italy to try and understand the contradictions and that is really what it is. Italy is singular in its cultural stackings. No other nation has all of these factors and in such a small land mass that is also unique as it is both a peninsula and part of main land europe. There is no direct analog. Greece has its ancient history but nothing like the rennasaince or 20th century fascist italy/made in italy la dolce vita era. UK has the modern empire but not the history etc. Italy is unique in that it does not resolve its contradictions into a singular identity but instead it lives with its contradictions. Family oriented but independent. National but regional. It goes on and on and on. There is truly nothing like it and it seeps into our football. We have Baggio in 1990? No we make Schillaci the folk hero. 94 is the individual genius vs the manager that wants his system to win. ugly defence first but then we score the most beautiful goals. It's just how it is with us. Because we went to the euro 2012 final and won 2020 I don't see it as a steady decline but us still in a cycle of chaos and glory even if it takes us another 30 years to win the world cup.
Doing a deep dive into France... all five of their non participations have been through failure to qualify. In 1950 in Brazil, they were invited after a few teams withdrew. But they declined the invitation.
Also, the 2022 failure isn't completely fair to say was by a single goal. Even if Italy weren't hit with that North Macedonian suckerpunch in the 91st, they would have had to eliminate Portugal in Portugal who were in better form.
Sometimes you have to be an Italian alone , in understanding Italian things - alone . Others do get it though I will concede but not to the level in which we do. Tis true , culture is the wellspring of a people and of each people....
France are funny I think many have overrated their modern dominance because we saw they could win again in 2026 which would write a particular story. Yes they have had 4 finals the last 30 years and two euro finals but Germany had 5 world cup finals and 4 Euros between 74 and 2002.
which shows how absurd UEFA qualifying is and then consider our Euro group had a Swiss team that has been a top 10 team this decade. It means we would have still failed at all these world cups but we are not qualifying because we have done a yoyo where we are a top 5 team at Euros and then drop to the 14th 15th best team in the world during world cup qualifying campaigns. Yes we suck for our standards but if we were eliminated by Spain Sweden Swiss Macedonia Portugal Norway Bosnia at the actual world cups it would have been the same thing.
Spain play two teenagers it should be a lesson. Guys like Scalvini/Leoni should be further along than they are. But big teams like Milan Juve Inter are not scooping up or developing our best CBs and they are just floating around randomly not getting the right experience. At the same time Spain keep clean sheets because of Rodri and their general team possession high up the pitch not their CBs individual defending. If you put Cubarsi on Inter or Italy he would look much worse. Spain play defensive football they just figure if we have the ball in your half you can never shoot on our goal and it mostly works. They wont even shoot unless it's a .90 xg chance because they don;t want to risk a counter. They respected our midfield in 2020 so much that they played without a striker so they could have more or less 6 midfielders vs our 3 but we hit them on the counter with Cheisa and again with Berardi who should have finished them before penalties.
We exposed Spain in two straight Euros ( 2016 with Conte and again in 2020 with Mancini ) . I would have thought that more nations by now would have followed suit in their plans , but perhaps they didnt have the coaching personnel and or players to implement the same efficacy. I don't know ?