Italy will earn €3m for playing Turkey in possibly the most insensitive friendly match ever next week.
Both teams failed to qualify for the upcoming World Cup in Qatar are losing in equally painful fashions in their play-off matches. Turkey lost after talismanic forward Burak Yilmaz missed the chance to score an equaliser with 85th minute penalty, blasting the ball over the bar. The Azzurri fell to a last minute winner after failing to take advantage of their dominance in Palermo.
As highlighted by Corriere dello Sport, the friendly between Turkey and Italy is completely useless from a sporting perspective following the loss to North Macedonia, but it is important for the FIGC.
The Italian FA will now have to face the economic realities of failing too qualify for the World Cup, so an extra €3m is useful at this point, even if no Azzurri fan is interested in the result.
L'Italia in Turchia per… tre milioni di euro: Mancini a Coverciano prepara la sfida di Konya https://t.co/iQ6ifDGNT4
— TUTTOmercatoWEB (@TuttoMercatoWeb) March 26, 2022
It’s a joke playing that game all about money pure fooking greed
erm, its not a joke at all, every game is a chance to build a new team… this can be Italys first win on their way to beating their own world record of unbeaten games! its all positive.
Unreal what is wrong with you people! These are starving players, fellow human beings who work hard.
Have a heart people, With ever rising energy prices and not to mention the price of fuel it is absolutely necessary for these low earners to get out there and play how else are they going to fill up the Ferrari or lambos parked in their private car parks!