One more point, just one, a draw – but what does “just” mean here? Italy has freed itself a little with its treacherous victory over its daily nightmare North Macedonia in Rome. 5:2, that doesn’t sound bad. And when it comes to direct qualification for the European Championship in Germany on Monday in Leverkusen, the substitute venue, against Ukraine, with the same points, for second place in qualification group C, then the Azzurri simply cannot lose after winning the first leg.
But what does “just” mean? The Ukrainian national football team is not exactly a small number, not North Macedonia. Among other things, there are two players on the offensive who are currently turning the Spanish league on its head with FC Girona: Artem Dovbyk and Viktor Tsygankov. A endured, bricked-up, old Italian 0-0 would be enough.
But Italy now has a national coach who, in his long career as a club coach, has always played offensively, always aggressively with and against the ball. Luciano Spalletti is rightly proud of his positive interpretation of the game; he has had it with Napoli in the last one Brought to the championship this season – literally and ideally. His Italy is starting to look a bit like him, as we saw against North Macedonia. And it’s probably not entirely useless to turn the film back this 5:2. It was much more of a thriller than Spalletti would have liked.
Jorginho takes a penalty as if he had kicked a medicine ball
Italy started, as the coach likes, with this typical swarming tactic: everyone on the move, constantly. If possible, the opponent should not understand what is happening to him. The full-backs storm along, pushing towards the middle so as not to stand on the feet of the wings. The midfield director, in this case Jorginho, should always have at least three options for distributing the ball – this is one of Spalletti’s philosophical principles, non-negotiable. The mechanics worked quickly, attack after attack.
When the score was 1-0, Italy received a penalty. 39th minute, it couldn’t be more ideal. And in fact, the player who was once considered a safe converter, the safest of all, took the ball, but missed the last three. Jorginho had announced it: “I’m kicking, I don’t feel any blockage.” And Spalletti made it clear that this fearlessness was the right attitude. One has to imagine that an anxious silence fell on the Roman Olympic Stadium and in the living rooms of Italy.
Jorginho ran up, made a bizarre jump as usual, his arms stretched out like a ballerino, and pushed the ball towards the goal, lamely and quite centrally. As if he had kicked a medicine ball, it should Corriere della Sera Write later. The North Macedonian goalkeeper was already heading towards a corner, but there was still enough time to turn back. Forgiven again. It was Friday the 17th – and for the Italians 17 is what other peoples are 13. It’s hard to imagine what would have happened if Jorginho’s awkward performance had eaten into the Italians’ self-confidence.
But Federico Chiesa was already preparing to drive out the demons. 71 seconds after the missed penalty, the Juventus left-winger increased the lead to 2-0 and six minutes later to 3-0. The game seemed to be over and the newspapers were already busy with the many puns that could be made with the 26-year-old’s name.
After Chiesa’s 3-0 win, the film breaks – suddenly the panic returns
“Fede”, short for Federico, is the Italian word for faith, and Chiesa is the word for church. So Italy had faith again, the good Chiesa put the church back in the middle of the village – at some point they will get tired of these games in the editorial offices. But wasn’t he just scaring away the specter with his class? Spalletti considers Chiesa to be the exceptional player in his team, the only star.
3-0 – that’s how we went into the second half. But then: film tear. North Macedonia, with nothing left to gain in this game other than a confirmation of their potential as Italy’s fearsome opponents, scored two goals out of nowhere, 3-2, and suddenly the panic was back. Spalletti said after the game that they had made themselves small and no longer went to the ball and into duels with the usual determination.
Everything was possible, even a collapse. But then two specialists scored goals who had not scored for the national team for a long time: Giacomo Raspadori (81st minute) and Stephan El Shaarawy (93rd). So 5:2. But the Italians probably won’t soon forget that they had their hands in their hair for an entirely unnecessary twenty minutes.
And now to the punchline of the day. If there were another penalty for Italy in the decider against Ukraine in Leverkusen, then yes, then Jorginho, as Jorginho himself said into the microphones, would be very much ready to compete again, of course – his arms would probably jump like a ballerino again stretched. And Spalletti: “I already told Jorginho: You’ll shoot the next one.” Persistence tends to turn into stubbornness.