Inaction is the fault of many. There was also a lot of technical confusion. If we really want to avoid the fourth slap in 2030, we need to run. So far football has managed to get by. In fact, he tried to lose
Changing is no longer a choice, it is an urgency. Italian football finds itself mourning another world elimination, the third in a row, because it has never recovered from its most serious illness: lack of courage. From this point of view, if Gravina were to resign he would at least provide clarity, leaving the field open for renewal, which without courage would in any case be useless. In the small Bosnian stadium not only a sporting goal collapsed but also the last tiring attempt to postpone to an indefinite tomorrow that change which already in 2018, after the first world championship slap, should have been embraced and put into practice. Instead, nothing happened, the promise of a profound reform of the system was transformed first into an ejaculation, then into a slogan and, in the end, into a joke.
towards the precipice
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Everything has remained more or less the same, imperceptible shifts, despite the numerous signs of crisis. Despite Covid, with its tragic legacy: human, sporting, economic. Every component of football is responsible for this immobility, without exception, in different forms and with different weights. If the Football Federation has done little on the topic of governance, for example (how is it possible that Serie A still counts for so little?) it is also true that the contribution of the League has been impalpable or even non-existent, as in the case of the no to the stages before the world playoffs. But politics also has a responsibility, as it has progressively removed any kind of support from football, just to avoid running the risk of unpopularity, while at the same time continuing to collect over 1.5 billion a year in tax and social security revenue. Mancini and Vialli’s European Championship had deluded that all the worst was behind us, the resistance to change finally found a solid anchor and the second World Cup slap, at home against North Macedonia, explained to us that this was not the case at all. Since then it has been a precipice, with the aggravating circumstance of technical confusion the likes of which had not been seen for years. We went from Mancini to Spalletti, from Spalletti to Gattuso, with an attempt for Ranieri in between. The national team, in a country in difficulty in terms of football, must also represent a model from a technical point of view. An added value, an engine. The national team must express a value much greater than the sum of the values of the individual players. It wasn’t like that. In fact, the opposite happened. The technical commissioner has the least responsibilities, as he put what he could into this very complicated adventure. I don’t know how well the combination with Buffon and Bonucci worked, but it certainly didn’t start out well and we know how it ended.
necessary to run
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What awaits us now will largely depend on Gravina. If he chose to step aside, a new chapter would open in a less poisoned context. The federal president himself would prefer, if he were to leave, for football to take the path of renewal rather than continuity. So a new name. After all, what sense would it make to pass the baton to someone who shared such a bitter defeat? No country that has won at least one World Cup has remained out of three consecutive tournaments. If we don’t want to improve this humiliating record, if we really want to avoid the fourth slap in 2030, we have to run. So far football has managed to get by. Indeed, made to lose.
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