Italy CT Roberto Mancini said he’s ‘sure’ the Azzurri will qualify for Qatar 2022 and revealed Jorginho is ‘sorry’ after the penalty miss. ‘But that’s football, maybe we’ll be lucky in the last match’.
The Azzurri drew 1-1 with Switzerland at the Olimpico on Friday, when former Udinese full-back Silvan Widmer scored the opening goal for the guests.
Giovanni Di Lorenzo equalised before half-time, while Jorginho missed a penalty in stoppages for Italy, who now need a win against Northern Ireland.
“He’s sorry, it’s clear,” Mancini said at a press conference after the match. “But that’s football, he’s sorry he missed the penalty. Maybe we’ll be lucky in the last match. The penalty was correct.”
The match against Northern Ireland will be decisive, as the Azzurri are only first on goal difference after another draw with the Swiss.
“It’s complicated but we are two goals ahead,” Mancini said. “We have to go there, try to play our game and win and hope that Bulgaria will have a great game.
“We have to play our game and win, this is our task. Right now, we must recover our energy, it was a very tough game. We need to be confident, even when things don’t seem to go well, they can change.
“The team always try to do their best, in some moments of the season the players struggle more and the many injuries are a demonstration of this.
Di Lorenzo: ‘I’m pleased with the goal; Jorginho? We’ll help him’
“Two goals are two goals; they seem like nothing but they are two goals… and then who says that Bulgaria cannot get a positive result? We are slightly ahead, now we are thinking about winning in Northern Ireland.”
Mancini admitted the squad are disappointed but stressed he’s sure the Azzurri will qualify for the 2022 World Cup.
“They are sorry, it’s normal,” he said. “And then a penalty like that in the 90th minute, it’s clear that they are sorry but nothing can be done now.
“We will get to the World Cup, I’m sure.”
This is not acceptable . The penalty miss in that last game against the Swiss fine. It this was on a silver platter in 90th minute. There is no way these guys go to Ireland and win big if they even win . And Swiss will trash Bulgaria with ease .
Agree. In fact, I wouldn’t be surprised if they draw against Northern Ireland. Feels like 2017 all over again.
Stay positive Mike!
Sorry Al I am the most pessimistic azzurri fan around Lmfao
England always gets easy groups and are on the way. Spain don’t need any help but Sweden helped them being awful against Georgia. And we keep shooting ourselves in the foot!!
Of course Spain got a gift from
Georgia that won’t happen to us I guarantee you that much
Switzerland having secured atleast 2nd place and playing away from home .. played with no pressure .. nothing to lose unlike Italy! Also Italy leaving aside the player omissions made it difficult for themselves! Should Donna have saved the goal .. is not playing regularly for Club affecting him?? Is Allegri ruining Loca and Chiesa?? Italy once renouned for their Defence, easily concedes goals these days …
As far as the missed Penalty … I will blame Mancini for this. However good a penalty taker is nerves can take over. After his miss last match against the Switz, Mancini shud have selected Bonucci and Berardi in the crucial Qualifiers as the penalty takers. Berardi scored against Belgium in the NL and recently hasn’t missed a penalty. Also I think Jorghino himself should have declined.
He talks a lot these days and comes across as extremely overconfident!!
Mancini should go for inform players and not depend on certain players to bail out the team. Why not pick Destro or Politano. Could have started Tonali in place of Barella who was carrying a knock, likewise Berardi over Belotti. I would have even brought in Lucca to cause problems in the opponents box with his height and physicality being served with pin point crosses!!
TOO SCARED FOR THE NEXT MATCH 😨 HOPEFULLY AWAY FROM HOME IN CRUCIAL QUALIFIER WILL DRIVE THEM BETTER WITH NO ROOM FOR COMPLACENCY!
Forza Azzurri 🇮🇹👍👊💙🍀
Could go either way. Italy are away and Switzerland at home. N. Ireland have conceded only 7 goals from 7 games, so it might be hard for Italy to score given they have no great striker.
It’s still in Italy’s hands, though.
It’d be a huge blow if they don’t make the WC, because they’ll be one of the favourites to win it if they get there.
We need to be clinical. I think one of the issues is they put too much kick in the ball and that is why it tends to often go over the crossbar or wide. We just saw that in the pen and moments before I think it was Chiesa over the same crossbar. There are a few guys like Bonucci who strikes it hard but it tends to be accurate and that is why he should have taken that pen even Bedardi.
To work with what we have right now instead of wishful thinking of give Italo players more playing time as Mancio recently pleaded with Serie A, I think if we can get the lads to put less kick (don’t curl, curve it, just less kick a subtle less only, caliber adjustment) in the ball it will not go wide or over, pls pass this along to our team. Oh and no canon balls from midfield, just keep the ball down and a smattering, smidget, less kick on the strikes, like a basketball just enough to propel it in
Italy should apply to qualify through CONCACAF. UEFA is a bit too taxing of late.
Mancini needs to be called out for his arrogance. He’s a one trick pony. nearly the same players in the same formation. even when we go false 9 it’s the same thing.
Fact is Mancini and Our Azzurri never recovered after Spina’s injury.
Good points roy…
this was hugely disappointing evening.. to many points left on the table
Swiss were demolished by italy in June.. come on, we should have gotten a win tonight..
Well they can always buy tickets. If Italy can’t beat N Ireland in a crunch game then they don’t deserve to go to the world cup. You could see in Jorginho’s body language that he was going to miss that shot. He missed 2 penalty shots against the Swiss that is 4 points lost. Savor the Euro win, ruff seas are ahead. Who wants to watch the world cup in the winter anyway?
I am sure you will not
Get there Mancini . N Ireland will try their hardest and Bulgaria will
Fold 4 or 5-0 to Swiss . Jorginho cost us 4 points and the 2 against Bulgaria
Lost at home are even worse
Thanks @BoB
Wanted to add few more points –
1) I’m not angry against Jorghino for missing the penalty but angry because of him taking it. He should have declined knowing there are players in better form to take it. He wanted to rectify his last miss .. but why make it about himself?? Swiss are a strong side and opportunities are at a premium with qualification at stake. Recently he has been talking a lot and is coming across as too full of himself .. whether on the Ballon d’or matter or recently talking on how he was relieved during Euro Final seeing that it was Saka who was going to take the crucial next kick after his miss and he was sure of him missing it … why say such a thing?!
2) Why’s Ventura bringing himself to focus during Italy’s Qualifiers?? Last round of qualifiers he made a comment on the qualification and yesterday few hours before the crucial qualifier he announced his retirement!!
You could only beat N Ireland 2-0 at home….and you think you’ll win big in Belfast?…… Mister you must be joking just get ready for playoffs
@Francis
2 goal cushion against N. Ireland should be enough as it will means the Swiss will have beat Bulgaria by 4 goals and more. Overall, Bulgaria are a bit better team than N. Ireland. They are not like Lithuania.
Belotti will win us big on Ireland, this has long ago become a farce i saw it from the nations league with spain, he needs to play the benched players like the names you all have mentioned and let them run in there all hungry to please, instead he is playing it safe with insigne belotti, when was the last time insigne scored? he may end up at TO like Govinco I hear.
Wanna win NI, do what you did with Belgium #1 FIFA ranked, hit the balls with less aggression so it won’t go wide, and it if you can’t get your hands on Uncrossing powder, take lime bathes and have a truck load of exorcists ghostbusters and an extra bus to supply them with delectable irish creme coffee and sweets. There you go. DO SOMETHING!
You guys are SO negative. Yeah, it is disappointing, but the Swiss are often better away from home. And you’d think that Italy had lost, judging by some of the comment’s above. Do people honestly think that professional footballer’s don’t know how to hit or curl a ball correctly!? Come on, even Jorgingo does, he scored all those pens on the trot. So he knows how, but it’s much harder when there’s pressure. What did Einstein say E=MC2. Everything is mass + energy. Thought’s are electrical. Way to project negative energy towards your own team. Ha!
We’ll see how Switzerland do when more pressure is on them + when they have to force it or go for broke. Anyway, Bulgaria + N.Ireland are about the same level qual-wise! Away to N.Ireland seem’s to be the tougher game, but the Swiss will still have to play a great match + hope that Italy have another off-night. To overtake them, even if they win 4-0, they’ll have to hope that Italy don’t win or only win by 2 clear-goals. Italy still has the advantage. I agree with Roy though, Jorginho has got a bit of a head on him since the Euro’s, he needed humbling + Mancio is loyal when perhaps he could play the more in-form guys. I only saw the highlight’s but some of them didn’t even seem fit last night, let alone on song. Good to see Tonali + Calabria on + Berardi playing well though + I don’t know if Ciro is the best forward they have at International level anymore? They missed him last night when in Rome, but Kean has the best ratio record, 1 in every 3 games for Italy, 4 in 12 and 5 in 9 at U-21 level. He’s more mobile(no pun intended) too, and he’s not carrying the same pressure + burden as Ciro, who’s gotten all that flak. But there’s been so many missed opportunities + little thing’s go against Italy that it has to turn around sooner or later, let’s not condemn them for failure before it’s even happened though.
Come on Italy!
The result last night was disappointing to say the least and still feels terrible the morning after.
Dont think Italy deserved anything from that game …they were a disgrace.
FI please stoo using bots to create chats
I can’t even imagine what it would be mentioned if ciro was in the pitch in this game. He would absorb all the hate from you guys who clearly can’t understand that Italy’s football is TRASH as you would only say “trash Ciro” etc. Thank god ciro was sidelines. Please tell me how did you like insignie performance, chiesa, barella, locatelli and jorginho? These guys can’t create a single chance in a 94 minute game and yet ciro was the problem for 4 months now.
An other average performance from an average Italy.
The penalty miss shows that come the big moments in a game we can’t rely Jorginho, for this reason alone he should not be real contender for the ballon d’or.
We still have no genuine attacking threat on a world class scale (we have potential in Chiesa) unlike so many grate Azzurri teams.
Like many of the the other posts I agree that N Ireland away is the harder of the two games italy and Switzerland have and I worry we’re goals will come from.
I hope to be proved wrong and we get a few early goals but I can see Italy drawing this game on Monday.
Once again proving that without Verratti, Italy’s midfield becomes average and constantly loses the ball in dangerous areas. Boggles the mind the way Italian media constantly pumps up limited players like Immobile, Jorgi, Insigne etc which only amps up the pressure and breaks them in big games.
Good thing Tonali and others are coming through.
Grow up people. Azzuri will comfortably win. I guess you forgot they are European champions
I’ve always liked Mancini but he must take responsibility
The Swiss where stronger and more dynamic maybe winning Euros has gone to his head
If a coach thinks that out of form Belotti is a better option than an on form Berardi it’s time to go
Why play Emerson he’s just steady without creating
Insigna needs to wake up
Where was Pesina?
Jorghinho needs to be rested he’s lost confidence
We need a new Gasparini aggressive style of play
If we do qualify we will be embarrassed if he keeps picking the same players
they won the euros for gods sake. they have won much in my 46 year old life. we should all be thankful!! id rather win in 2006 and 2021 and not qualify for 4 tournaments than be like england and win nothing!!!
Forza Italia!!