They are used to better than this in Naples. At the Stadio Diego Armando Maradona, the home side usually plays with desire and intensity for the full 90 minutes and beyond, but the Italian national team was only able to give them half of what they were used to, writes Giancarlo Rinaldi.
The Azzurri were almost unwatchable for the opening 45 minutes as they were undone by two corners – one of which fell to Declan Rice and the other resulted in the penalty which made Harry Kane England’s top scorer.
Their overall play was passive and predictable after an early flurry and they were lucky not to fall further behind when Jack Grealish spurned a simple chance before the interval. A normally stirring stadium was disturbingly quiet.
The Three Lions were able to move the ball around unhurried and untroubled for the majority of the first half as Roberto Mancini’s men struggled to put them under any pressure. New boy Mateo Retegui looked isolated and a defence marshalled by Rafael Toloi and Francesco Acerbi looked terribly perforable. The defending European champions were a shadow of the side which was victorious at Wembley.
Perhaps the shame of dishing up such a spectacle to a city used to much better served to fuel a significantly improved second half. Or maybe it was a stirring half-time talk by an undoubtedly irate Italy coach. This was how the team was meant to be – like a proper pizza that had finally cast off its horrendous ham and pineapple topping.
Mancini was brave not to make wholesale changes at the interval and his faith in his starting XI paid off. They started to put England under pressure further up the pitch and it resulted in the goal he hoped for. A lovely Lorenzo Pellegrini assist to new boy Retegui – so isolated up until then – was enough to reopen the match. It was also sufficient to justify the Italo-Argentinian’s surprising call-up.
There was only really one team in it after that – even more so after Luke Shaw saw red – but they could not break down Gareth Southgate’s resolute defence. Wilfried Gnonto looked lively, Matteo Politano produced good trickery but it just wasn’t enough in the end. It left the same bitter regret as ordering your espresso in a café where nobody knows how to use the coffee machine properly.
The loss of Federico Chiesa to injury took a star performer out of this side and Mimmo Berardi was on one of his more uninspired nights. Jorginho struggled in the midfield and might be on his last legs in that role after being a hero of Euro 2020. But nobody really came out of the first half with any great honour.
Ultimately, though, this game confirmed many things we already knew about this side. It is one team when it takes control of a match and quite another when it is unable to do so. Mancini’s efforts to make the Azzurri go out and impose themselves at all times are still a work in progress.
They also need to get back to showing they have what it takes to suffer and survive when they are under pressure without conceding goals. England were able to unlock them with relative ease when they were on top.
There is comfort in the fact that the top two from this group will progress to Euro 2024 but this was still a disappointing opening result. The opponent was one of the continent’s stronger outfits but they would still have hoped to at least avoid defeat. They will have to bounce back quickly in Malta.
Question marks will remain over which version of Italy seen in Naples was the real one. If they can bottle the enthusiasm, enterprise and entertainment of the second half and use it throughout their remaining games then they should be fine. If, on the other hand, they produce their form of the first 45 minutes – La Nazionale is really in trouble.
There was enough material for optimists and pessimists to feel they were in the right when the full time whistle blew. For long spells the Azzurri looked a long way short of their opponents’ levels and that has to be a concern.
On the other hand, they showed plenty of character to haul themselves back into a game which they could easily have ended up drawing. You can make your own decisions on what side of the fence you are on.
It was disappointing, though, that in their first game without Gianluca Vialli they could not get at least a point. Perhaps they were played his rousing speech from the last Euros at half-time to awake them from their slumber.
Whatever the case, they owe his memory a better and more sustained performance than this one. There is still time to do him justice when the other qualifying fixtures roll around – just give us more of that second half performance please.
Couldn’t disagree more. If anything, we started too fast, too rushed in possession and too eager to play at a high tempo. Ultimately it was cheap losses of possession that resulted in both corners. We are always at our best when calm, and end up playing to our strengths. The same mistakes were evident vs Macedonia this time last year. Too rushed both in possession as well as with pointless shots towards goal. Almost convinced ourselves that we have to play at 100 mph in order to succeed. England did nothing bar time waste for 95 minutes. Two corners, and that was practically it. Once we began playing, they realised they were inferior and slowly but surely sunk back into their usual tactic of parking the bus and wasting time.