The problems facing Italy stretch beyond the defending World Cup champions' performance in South Africa, the head of Italian soccer said on Monday. One of the world's great soccer nations needs to develop players. "It's a problem we're going to have to reflect on after this World Cup. But it's not a problem related to one or two specific players," Giancarlo Abete said. "We don't have any Golden Ball-level players anymore. It's a larger problem with Italian football. We're going through a generational change. There are also problems at the youth level and the under-21 team." Italy has scored only five goals in its last seven matches and only one forward has found the target in open play: Fabio Quagliarella in a 1-1 draw with Switzerland in a pre-World Cup friendly. "We're not scoring much and therefore when we allow goals it becomes much tougher to turn the game around," Abete said. "We have a problem finishing." Nine players on the Azzurri squad are 30 or over, led by 36-year-old captain Fabio Cannavaro, who was responsible in part for both of the goals Italy has allowed so far. "All the European teams are having problems," Abete said. "With the exception of Brazil and the Netherlands nobody is entering the third game comfortably." Our Players on the International radar don't even exist...except for the ones/fans that follow the Serie A league in Italia. I certainly blame the FIGC for failure in this aspect of things by not having stricter rules against these top clubs in Italy not giving young and highly skilled Italian players a chance to play and showcase their talent... as do our latin american brothers and their respective clubs. More investment must be made with Italian talent brought forward to the high competitions and less on the amount of foreign talent that seem to be nesting themselves in Italian Football. Most certainly a concern for Italian Football ...don't you thinks so.
Well he's got that right. Hopefully he cares enough to do something. Or else we need to start paying off the young talented oriundi in South America to play for us. At least they'll still have some Italian blood and Italian sounding names unlike Germany and France.
In this case...I blame The FIGC( Italian Federation ) , Marcello Lippi and the team. The responsibility and the whole mess falls on their shoulders. I would ask them to resign now or simply fire them!!! I think having foreign players strengthens our italian game with their skill and clout but the choosing over prime italian talent for our serie A - that is a major error. What you saw at Italia's world cup campaign is the present state of Italian Football - what you see is what you get..and we got nothing!!!! shame, shame and shame...on all of the above ( FIGC, Big Clubs, LIPPI, ITA-Team ) mentioned. Not only have we lost our respect, but we also lost our recognition and status. A major dis-service to the Italian people, the people that support and love Italian football and all the Italians all over the world! Imagine the impression it has left on the young Italian talent, we can't even talk..let alone hold our head high..disgrace and a vergonha!!!!! Cesare Prandelli...lets see what happens because enough is enough, when is it going to stop and begin
I think more Italian players need to play in the English and Spanish leagues. Serie A is a now a 2nd tier, two-team league (actually, a one-team league for the past few years), and no Italian seems to be able to break into Inter's starting lineup. Even AC Milan has no young and emerging Italian players. I don't think Italy will be able to develop world class talent if its next generation is stuck in a declining league, playing against middling competition. If Daniele de Rossi is the future of Italy, I think that spells trouble.
Wow... Wait to demonstrate a complete and total lack of knowledge about Serie A. One-team league? Inter was embattled with AS Roma throughout the season, losing to i giallorossi in March and barely squeaking by in Coppa Italia. Way to show an absolute and total ignorance of Serie A. Any other league would have bucked after calciopoli. We just move on.
zdrav is right on one point, italy's promising young talents should look abroad for opportunities to play and play in the posititions they are best equipped for. They should look abroad and at lower Serie A clubs...and then its up for NT management to finally give these guys a look regardless of which clubs they play for.
well the good sign is the problem is recognized, thats the first step in fixing it. Most people dont want to admit to their problems, therefore they never get solved. Italian football in general needs a change of mentallity and make sure the big teams have young italians participating in their main games. They need to start developing players and stop the theatrics and the rugged foul prone, pushing and shoving game. Just play beautiful football, there are lots of technical players in italy but they get sidelined for some oldies. Look at milan for example; over the past they keep using old players, therefore the young generation gets wasted on gaining experience
Won't disagree with you there. It's time for Italians to get with the times. There's nothing wrong with having a lot of Italian players in our league, but we don't need only Italian players and Italian players don't only need the Italian league. If EPL is hiring, go to EPL, go to Spain, hell, go to eastern Europe if they'll take you.
The problem is that the best teams dont even want to develop good players, you can see Inter doesnt even have one italian other than Materazzi, Roma doesnt have many italians, Palermo has almost no italians, Milan got some but they are getting old. There has to be some regulation in order to have italian players playing for the team or cut the number of extra comunitarian players.
Palermo is mostly Italians; Sirigu, Bovo, Cassani, Balzaretti, Nocerino, Migliaccio and Miccoli are all first teamers. edit: Maccarone will probably start as well this coming season
just a request to all people who don't know what they are talking about: please stop talking. Palermo has almost no italian players? inter wins one year without an italian starter - of course this conveniently ignores the fact that Zanetti, Motta, Cambiasso, Burdisso, Milito (I believe that Milito is a italian), Mancini are all of italian descent - and suddenly italians are a backwater of calcio, not athletic and lazy. beh. all the hate for italia really blinds the rest of the world.
My bad, confused Palermo with Catania... I just think that in order to have a competitive national team your competitive teams must have italian players. Like in 2006 with Juve, Roma and Milan. And no, i dont hate Italy... its my fatherland. And im sad to not see a new Maldini, Cannavaro, Nesta, Totti, Del Piero, Vieri, Buffon, etc.
The topic of this conversation is: ITALY not developing enough elite players. All those players that you just mentioned are from Argentina, and play for Argentina. Well, some of them should've! Anyways. So what if they are Italian decent, I am, but I am not an Italian citizen, and therefore are not italian.
Have an italian last name? You're italian. They won't play for a national team. Oh well. They're still of the italian blood and we still have more naturally gifted and talented calciatori by birth.
Hi every one! Just wanted to say it's great to be part of a forum that is so passionate about Italian football and are national team.
They are not Italian born or raised. If you were born in Italy or came to Italy during school age then you can play for Italy. Taking players from others countries because they are not good enough for them is pretty sad and is cheating because we can't depend on creating our own players.
again, not talking about the national team, talking about the ethnicity. players of italian descent > other players it is history. it is our sport. i take pride in the success of brazil and argentina. una faccia, una razza. you should really update with the modern world because this tired old idea that serie a need only be of italian players and italian players only need to play in serie a is antiquated. globalization. we have the best players, but that doesn't mean other countries can't or shouldn't contribute to our league and vice versa. i'm fine with the multi-ethnic inter champions. it's a sign of the globalized nature of europe. emrace us being a place of destination for people around the world. would you rather be an eastern european country where no one wants to immigrate or work in?
So Italian players playing in Italy is antiquated?! Globalisation is a crock.... It's about cheap labour.