If Italy qualified, it would have an easy group, and so would the eventual round of 32. Here’s what to do to avoid failing again
It will be more difficult to go to the World Cup than, if we qualify, to get through the preliminary round and reach the round of 32, and perhaps continue beyond. Because the draw – at least that one – was good for us: Juventus player David’s Canada awaits us, the host but far from insurmountable; Switzerland, which eliminated us first from the World Cup and then from the European Championships, however remains a team within our reach; little Qatar. Not only that, even the first opponent in the direct elimination phase would probably be within reach: if we were to win the group we would face the third from another group; if we finished second we would find the second of the group made up of Mexico, South Korea, South Africa and another winner of the European play-offs. In short, at the end of the March playoffs for the Azzurri there is a small decline. The problem is to take it, the descent, without derailing between Northern Ireland, Wales, Bosnia.
head to the playoffs
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It was sad and melancholy not to see the word Italy among the forty-two that already make up the World Cup vocabulary. Precisely to escape these feelings, our people stayed at home: neither the federal president Gravina nor the coach Gattuso were in Washington and certainly not out of superstition but out of an understandable sense of modesty. Everyone’s minds cannot be on America now, they must remain focused on Bergamo, where we will play the semi-final against Northern Ireland; in the meantime we study Wales and Bosnia, who we would find in the final. We will think about the rest – Canada, Switzerland, Qatar – from the night of March 31st, if everything goes well. The fact that we expect an easy group may not be irrelevant, however, because a team like ours – weak more in the head than in the feet and muscles – could receive an injection of confidence: come on, let’s put these two early spring games behind us and then have fun.
danger averted
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When it came to drawing the balls from the last pot, number four, reserved for those who have yet to play the playoffs as well as some teams of very modest strength (Haiti, Curaçao, New Zealand), we feared that the draw could also turn against the Azzurri. There was the risk of falling into a very complicated group, such as the one formed by Brazil, Morocco and Scotland, or in otherwise difficult groups (in one there were Germany, Ecuador and Ivory Coast, in another Spain and Uruguay as well as Saudi Arabia). Instead, this time fate gave us a hand, the one it denied us when it placed Norway in the same group as Italy in the European qualifiers. Now it’s our turn.
no regrets
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It is clear that the new World Cup formula makes qualification possible even in the toughest groups because, in addition to the top two in each group, the eight best third-placed teams (out of twelve) also advance. There is therefore room for teams that start their American adventure badly to be rescued (this happened to us in the United States in 1994, when we then reached the final). However, the fact that we have three possible opponents of the caliber of Canada, Switzerland and Qatar in front of us is comforting. It is essential now that Italy does not underestimate any aspect in the process of approaching the playoffs, because we cannot afford to have regrets. We have ascertained that it is practically impossible to postpone a matchday of the championship to allow Gattuso to work with the Azzurri for a prolonged period of time, but having the players in Coverciano for two or three days would still be very useful. We continue to be convinced that the national team has no shortage of quality players: we won’t be among the three best selections in the world, but there are certainly no sixteen players superior to us in Europe, as many as go to the World Cup.
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