Roberto Mancini has broken his silence and blames FIGC President Gabriele Gravina for his sudden departure from the Italy job. ‘He could’ve kept me if he wanted to, for a year he was trying to revolutionise my staff.’
The CT was under contract until July 2026, but tended his resignation on Saturday evening and it was accepted on Sunday morning with a formal announcement from the Federation.
Now Mancini has spoken to La Repubblica newspaper and given his version of events, openly blaming President Gravina.
“I explained to him that in these months I needed to be given support and calm, but he didn’t do that and so I resigned.”
The problems had been apparent throughout the summer, so Mancini was criticised for leaving just weeks before the crucial EURO 2024 qualifiers.
“Should I have done it earlier? Perhaps. But I left the Nazionale with 25 days to go before the next game, not three days.”
It came just days after Mancini had been given extra powers in a new role as co-ordinator of the Azzurri including Under-20 and Under-21 levels, with many of his staff members appointed to roles in the youth teams.
However, it seems Mancini saw that as less of a promotion and more of a way to split apart his working group.
“Gravina had been trying for a year to revolutionise my staff. I tried to tell him that at most he could add a couple of new faces, but he couldn’t take away two members of a group that works and had won. If anything, it should be me who decides to substitute a member of my staff.”
The CT also hinted he had hoped to just send Gravina a message about how badly things were going, but the FIGC leapt at the chance to get rid of him instead.
“Gravina had for a while thought about things very differently from me. I was massacred purely for my decision. I wanted to send a signal to the President, he could’ve helped me if he had wanted to.”
Mancini also confirmed he wanted to eliminate the clause in the contract allowing the Federation to sack him if he failed to qualify for EURO 2024.
“I had only asked that so that I’d have some peace and quiet over the next few months. Obviously, I would’ve gone if things didn’t go well and we failed to qualify.”
Good thing he didn’t.