De Rossi returns to the national team. For the world playoffs Italy needs the magic group

“Let us join together in cohort, we are ready to die, Italy called”. The men who take the field are important, but sometimes the team spirit, the alchemy, the magic that is created between them, is even more so. The Italy that won the European Championship was a prime example of this.

A little more than six months later, thanks to the lack of direct qualification for the World Cup, that magic seems to have faded a bit and in view of the play-offs against Macedonia on March 24 and, hopefully, in the final against Portugal or Turkey on March 29, it goes absolutely recreated if we do not want to fail to participate in the World Cup for the second consecutive time. Chiesa’s injury and Spinazzola’s failure to recover are further problems for the coach Mancini to face, but if the spirit that has characterized the ride up to Wembley 2021 is found again, even the absence of precious pieces can be absorbed.

The return

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And to recreate that magic, the Federation and the coach decided to recompose the same technical staff that accompanied the Azzurri to the company in Mancini’s service. One of them, Daniele De Rossi, the last to join the group, was self-excluded in August after thanking everyone publicly, “for the wonderful experience”, in an open-hearted interview with Sportweek. His desire to train had led him, out of respect for the group, to withdraw. He didn’t want Daniele to feel in the balance: to be part of the staff who had to compete for the qualification and wait for a call from a club. The delays caused by Covid to get the license and enroll in the Uefa Pro course necessary to be the “first coach” in Serie A, forced him to postpone the appointment with the bench. Too serious then Daniele to back down. It was the coach and the federation who thought about it and asked him if he would like to come back and provide his experience, empathy and the ability to team up in a delicate moment. De Rossi did not hesitate to give his immediate consent. Too strong is the love for the Azzurri shirt, the sense of gratitude towards the Figc and Mancini who have always been “spectacular” with him, as Daniele has often remembered.

Together

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De Rossi immediately joined the technical staff, which he himself described as a family. Despite being the last to enter, some emblematic frames clarify what he was able to give to the group, beyond the participation in the preparation of the matches requested by Mancini from his closest collaborators. Daniele carrying the injured Spinazzola on his shoulders at Wembley under the curve of the fans to exult is the image of how much he has put himself at the service of all. His dive on a locker room table after winning the Cup instead is the last link between the player De Rossi, a companion among his teammates, and the coach De Rossi waiting for a bench. Daniele will participate in the next blue stage starting from Wednesday. The search for magic and smiles also passes through him. It was not by chance that De Rossi summarized perfectly, with a sentence under the photo of the national team in celebration, the secret of the Azzurri: “We didn’t all laugh because we won. But we won because we all laughed”.