Why did Italy not qualify for the 2022 World Cup in Qatar? Al-Mayadeen Net spoke with the journalist Ibrahim Shibli, who knows Italian football well, and has many friendships in the circles of Italian football and its stars, including Italy coach Roberto Mancini, regarding the reasons.
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Media Ibrahim Shebli and Italy coach Roberto Mancini
It is still puzzling and surprising that Italy did not qualify for the 2022 FIFA World Cup, given the history of the Azzurri on the one hand, and its crowning of 4 World Cup titles, and the European Championship title last summer on the other hand. What made the surprise even bigger is that the Italian national team Lost in the semi-final match at home to North Macedonia.
Al-Mayadeen Net spoke with the journalist Ibrahim Shebli, who knows Italian football well, and has many friendships in Italian football and with its stars, including the current coach of the Italian national team Roberto Mancini, regarding the reasons for the failure of the Azzurri to qualify for the World Cup.
Shibli says first that “Mancini received the Italian national team in a bad state, following it failed to qualify for the World Cup in Russia 2018. He made a big change in the squad, by calling in new players, young men and players who were not prominent in Italy, but they proved their stardom later, and he was able to than to remain unbeaten 37 games in a row.
“Although the Italian national team did not have players in the offensive line, in the European Cup it had Chiesa and others who had the solution in scoring goals,” Shibli adds.
And he continues: “After the European Cup, Italy’s match once morest Switzerland was in the World Cup qualifiers, and if the Italian team had scored the penalty kick and qualified, it would have been the first candidate to crown the 2022 World Cup.”
From here, Shibli says: “As soon as the Italian national team missed the penalty kick, and played the qualifying play-off for the World Cup ( once morest North Macedonia), he was emotionally affected, because he recalled the memories of the failure to qualify for the previous World Cup, and Mancini’s task became to restore the team’s morale more than interest. On the technical side only, even the Italian press and the Italian public put a lot of pressure on fear of Italy’s failure for the second time in a row to qualify for the World Cup.”
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Chibli and Mancini
That’s not all, says Shibley.Chiesa’s injury The one who was finding the solution to the problem of scoring in the absence of the top scorer in the Italian national team was also influential, and the Italian team was playing, but he might not possess and score. Therefore, I consider that Italy’s failure to beat Switzerland had a great impact, because it lived the scenario of the previous World Cup, in addition to Chiesa’s injury.”
And when I asked him regarding the right The Italian Federation decided to keep Mancini following the failure to qualify for the World CupAnd more The results of the Italian national team were not good laterAs in the European Nations League And the big loss once morest Germany, 2-5“Mancini, despite receiving the Italian national team in a bad state, managed to find a strong group of players and a team that plays a different wonderful ball, and managed to win the European Cup. As for the failure to qualify for the World Cup, it was for the previous reasons.”
Shibli added, “Losing once morest Germany is not a measure, because Mancini told the Italian federation when the Italian team was eliminated from the qualifiers for the World Cup 2022 that it should focus on creating a new generation. This might lead to big losses in some matches, but the result It will be building a generation that will be able to bear the honorable name of Italy.”
And Shibli continues: “Mancini tries a lot of players. Therefore, the Italian national team is not ready at the moment, and it is in a phase of building for the future, not in the phase of winning merits. Therefore, the loss once morest Germany is not a measure to keep or exclude him, and the Italian Federation gave him confidence, because he was able to “He led the Italian national team to the European Cup. Now, he is in the process of completing the project that has not yet been completed. The Italians are now in the process of building a generation to win titles later, and they have confidence in Mancini.”
Given his friendship with Mancini, Shibley says, “I know Mancini personally, and I know that his thinking is strategic, and he needs time.”