Italy the ultimate underdogs: 1982 World Cup

While 2006 is fresher in the memory and many of us weren’t even born at the time, the 1982 World Cup squad will always remain the ultimate expression of football for Italy.

It is the image that graced a million Italian restaurants around the world, the poster of the 1982 World Cup winning team. Even after the Azzurri took the trophy again in 2006 and new posters were released of Fabio Cannavaro holding the trophy aloft, many kept that 1982 picture on their walls too. It had become a shrine to that wonderful summer when Paolo Rossi, Marco Tardelli and Dino Zoff thrilled the global audience and created what to this day remain the ultimate images of what football can mean to people.

There is a recurring theme when the Nazionale do end up winning trophies, one we recognised even in EURO 2020. They are never the favourites going in, often there will be some sort of national scandal or chaos in the build-up that the team has to isolate itself from and that only serves to make their bond stronger. In 2006, it was the Calciopoli trial that would send many of the World Champions to Serie B just weeks after that glorious night in Berlin. In 1982, it was the Totonero betting scandal that erupted in 1980 and among others saw Paolo Rossi given a three-year ban, reduced to two on appeal.

That ruled him out of the 1980 European Championship and he only returned to the field from April 1982, for the final two games of the Serie A season with Juventus. In the circumstances, it was considered sheer madness for coach Enzo Bearzot to pick Rossi for the World Cup, a man who had played only two competitive matches in two years and still carried the taint of that match-fixing scandal.

Italy also has the tendency to discover a great talent during the major tournament, someone who flies from relative obscurity to legend and never gets near those heights again in their career. Fabio Grosso in 2006. Toto Schillaci in 1990. But with Rossi, it was the opposite of someone becoming famous over the summer. He was already infamous. When the likes of Roberto Pruzzo and Evaristo Beccalossi are left at home to bring along a character like Rossi, it’s not so much bravery from Bearzot as an immense leap of faith off a cliff.

The Nazionale really developed their underdog status with a dismal start, drawing all three games in the first group stage and scraping through on goal difference ahead of Cameroon. The headlines said it all: ‘No glory for Italy and what’s worse no hope either.’

This set them on a path towards an incredibly tough second group phase against the favourites, but this is where the miracles started to occur. Diego Armando Maradona’s Argentina were the reigning world champions, but while it’s easy to remember this game as Claudio Gentile kicking chunks out of El Pibe de Oro, it’s worth remembering the Seleccion were every bit as rough as the old-school Azzurri. It was a battle, with Tardelli opening the scoring, then Bruno Conti pouncing on a save to dummy the goalkeeper at the by-line and pull back for Antonio Cabrini to blast into the roof of the net.

Brazil were in the stands watching that game, safe in the knowledge their samba style made them the absolute favourites to dominate the tournament, and went on to sweep Argentina aside in a 3-1 masterclass. To this day, they are known as the best team never to win the World Cup, but this is why it is so important that Italy went head-to-head and beat them. There can be no arguments, no doubts.

Due to goal difference, the Azzurri had to beat Brazil to continue in the competition. It seemed hopeless, but these are the situations were Italian football tends to flourish, when there’s nothing to lose. “We all assumed that after beating Argentina, Italy were going to be a walk in the park,” confessed Oscar many years later.

Until this point, Rossi hadn’t scored a single goal, but Cabrini floated a cross onto his head at the back post just five minutes in. Zico and Socrates combined to score from the tightest angle, but Rossi made the most of their arrogance by ghosting in behind defenders to steal a lazy pass and restore Italy’s lead. Collovati’s injury meant the introduction of the world’s oldest-looking 18-year-old, moustachioed Beppe Bergomi. Paulo Roberto Falcao thumped in for 2-2 from the edge of the box, a result that would qualify Brazil, but once again Rossi popped up out of nowhere to redirect in from a corner, completing the first ever hat-trick a player had put past the Seleçao. In the final minute, 40-year-old Dino Zoff just about smothered an Oscar free header on the line to seal the iconic 3-2 result.

Much like the 2006 semi-final with Germany, this game felt more like the Final than the actual decider. It was like a blessing, that knowledge that they were surely unstoppable now. Rossi put another two goals past Poland and secured his top scorer status in the 3-1 Final victory over West Germany.

The most famous image of that tournament though was not Rossi, who after that World Cup in Spain forever would become known as Pablito, but Marco Tardelli. His face after scoring in the Final is what you would show to any human, even an alien from another planet, to describe what football means. Pure, unadulterated, incredulous joy. It would be repeated by Fabio Grosso after another goal against Germany in extra time in 2006. We’ll have to wait a while, but Italians know we’ll see that scream again one day at a World Cup.

@SusyCampanale