Conte’s first return since his departure in the summer should be a homecoming. Instead the mood is one of mixed emotions, writes James Horncastle
Six months into the job and Italy coach Antonio Conte cuts a jaded figure. “There’s never any peace around the national team,” he complained, “and there’s never any peace around me.”
Controversy stirred soon after the 45-year-old had named his squad. Asked for his reaction, the Inter trainer Roberto Mancini had an issue with the inclusion of Eder, the Sampdoria striker, and Franco Vazquez, the Palermo forward.
One was born in Brazil. The other in Argentina. “I have my own ideas on this,” he explained. “The Italian national team should be Italian. For me, a player born in Italy deserves the blue jersey. Who isn’t born here, even if they have relatives, does not deserve it.”
The constitution says otherwise, but the Oriundo debate is a recurring one. The term connotes someone from another country but of Italian heritage. Eder, for example, has a great grandfather from Nove-San Floriano in north-east Italy. Vazquez’s relatives are not so distant. His mother Marina hails from Padova.
“I’m not the first, nor will I be the last to select Oriundi,” Conte stated. Italy has a long tradition of it. Eder and Vazquez are the 41st and 42nd. The first was Ermanno Aebi, a Swiss-Italian, in 1920. Arguably the most famous, Luisito Monti, remains the only player to represent two different nations in World Cup finals: Argentina in 1930 and Italy in 1934.
It divides opinion. Oriundi are often framed as cynical opportunists who accept Italy’s advances because competition for places in their birth country is too fierce. Their loyalties and motives are questioned. Pictures emerged of Eder and his family in Brazil shirts. Vazquez defines himself on Twitter as an Argentine footballer. Specific cases provoke different reactions. For instance, no one kicked up a fuss when the German-born Roberto Soriano came on for Manuel Pasqual and made his debut against Croatia at San Siro last November.
Responses can be hypocritical too. “If Ronaldo or Messi had Italian relatives [incidentally, the Argentine does] no one would say anything about it,” Marcello Lippi observed. And one imagines that had the young and gifted Paulo Dybala or Mauro Icardi accepted the FIGC’s courtship rather than hold out for a place in Argentina’s squad then their decision and selection would have been less contested and more celebrated than those of Eder and Vazquez. Low profile and 28 and 26 respectively the common refrain has been is there really no one better coming through Italy’s own youth systems?
Conte could have called up Sassuolo phenom Domenico Berardi but instead cautioned against fast-tracking his rise to the senior team in favour of leaving him with the Under-21s and not rushing his development. Milan striker Mattia Destro was another possible option.
There isn’t a poverty of choice but nor is there an abundance of riches in forward positions. Serie A’s top 10 goalscorers include four Argentines, a couple of Brazilians [of which Mancini would argue Eder is one], a Frenchman and three Italians all of whom are in their 30s, although Luca Toni and Toto Di Natale are closer to 40.
Italy has many of the same issues as England. Of the players in Serie A, 53.8% are foreign and they play 54.1% of the minutes. Fiorentina and Internazionale - here the clue is in the name - often field starting XIs featuring no Italian players and Lippi claims that “just 34% are eligible” to be capped by Italy.
It’s been hard for youngsters to emerge. Serie A’s 20 clubs spent €55m on their academies last year. By contrast the Bundesliga’s 18 members invested €79.3m in their talent factories. A study by the CIES Football Observatory showed that only 8.4% of players in Serie A first teams are formed by their clubs.
There’s a lack of opportunity for kids too. Players aged 20 or under in France clocked up 26,337 top flight minutes last season. Their contemporaries in Germany accumulated 23,877, in England 17,669 and in Spain 14,863. Meanwhile in Italy the figure was 13,992, the lowest recorded among Europe’s five most prestigious domestic competitions, just as it was for the number of Italian Under-21 players to have played at least one game in the big leagues: 128 were French, 90 Spanish, 66 German, 52 English and 46 Italian.
Sassuolo and Empoli are beginning to invert the trend and affect a change in mentality by demonstrating that you can be successful and upwardly mobile by placing faith in youth. Milan are beginning to follow suit by restoring an Italian identity to its first team with several local acquisitions.
But for now Conte can only draw from the pool he has available to him. “It’s right to call them up, even if they are Oriundi,” Lippi added. Eder came on in Bulgaria on Saturday night and marked his debut with a goal that rescued Italy a point in a 2-2 draw. “A Brazilian saves Conte,” proclaimed the front-page of Il Corriere dello Sport.
The atmosphere is especially tense around the Italy camp at the moment. After the Oriundo hullabaloo came another heated one. Claudio Marchisio injured himself in a warm-up on Friday. The severity of it was bitterly disputed. Reports claimed he had torn his ACL. But later that evening a scan supervised by Juventus in Turin contradicted them, ruling out a tear.
John Elkann, the president of Exor, the club’s majority shareholder, sought an explanation as to why Conte works his players so hard. “At Juventus he was a coach,” Elkann said. “With the national team he is a selector, they’re two different jobs.” Conte replied: “He never asked these sorts of questions when I was at Juventus.”
Relations with his former club have been ice cold ever since his shock resignation in late July, a decision that deeply inconvenienced the Italian champions. Scheduled visits to watch Juventus train as part of his rounds as Commissario Tecnico were twice postponed at short notice.
His decision to call up Andrea Barzagli who has only just returned after nine months out with an injury he suffered on international duty wasn’t appreciated and so you can imagine how the news that Marchisio had got hurt was received, particularly with Paul Pogba and Andrea Pirlo already in the infirmary.
Conte received threats when the story broke and this could prove the straw that breaks the camel’s back. He is said to be deeply disillusioned and, not for the first time, giving serious thought to his position.
Tuesday’s friendly with England at the Juventus Stadium, Conte’s first return there as a coach since his departure in the summer, should be a homecoming. Instead the mood is one of mixed emotions.
Prior to walking out on an interview with RAI following persistent questioning about Marchisio on Saturday, he was asked what reception he expects in Turin. “A hug from my daughter,” Conte said. Nothing more. How on earth did it come to this?
Italy vs. England: Tactical Preview of International Friendly
England travel to Italy to round off their first international break of 2015, fresh off the back of a thumping 4-0 win over Lithuania in the European qualifiers.
The match against the Azzurri is only an exhibition, but it does give Roy Hodgson the chance to exact revenge against a team who beat them at the FIFA World Cup 2014.
Italy Setup
If you've ever wondered how tense it is up there on the hot seat of international management, look no further than Antonio Contereceiving death threats, per the Toronto Sun, over the revelation that Claudio Marchisio injured knee ligaments in warm-up training for Italy.
It removes one dollop of quality from a squad strangely shorn of it; if you look at the Azzurri's roster for the match against England, it's almost alien in its make-up due to the lack of established stars.
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Possible Italy XI.
Conte has stuck to his back three while at the helm of the southern European nation and will likely lean on his Juventus charges again. But up front there are serious question marks: Are things so bad that an out-of-form Graziano Pelle is called up, in addition to Sampdoria'sEder, who was born in Brazil?
The Azzurri have shown a willingness to go two up front, so expect combination play in the final third in the most traditional of manners.
England Setup
Roy Hodgson confirmed to journalists after the Lithuania victory that several of his players would be returning to their clubs. RaheemSterling was to go home, Danny Welbeck picked up an injury during the game and will not feature, and James Milner is nursing an issue that requires treatment from Manchester City.
It leaves the Three Lions rather scarce up front, as Daniel Sturridge had already withdrawn from the squad, and more or less forces Hodgsoninto a situation where he has to start with one striker in case one gets injured and he can't replace him. Captain Wayne Rooney will likely get the nod, leaving Harry Kane on the bench again.
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It is a friendly, so the boss will assess his options and rotation elsewhere will occur. Hodgson confirmed Leighton Baines would drop so that Kieran Gibbs and Ryan Bertrand could share a game, and Chris Smalling could come in for Phil Jones.
Ross Barkley and Theo Walcott are wild-card selections to start in what is presumed to be a 4-3-3.
Key Point 1: A Tempered Attack?
If anything, England can only be accused of being too gung-ho at the World Cup 2014. They flew out of the blocks in the first game inManaus and left themselves uncharacteristically open at the back, opening holes for Claudio Marchisio and Antonio Candreva to exploit.
But this isn't the same Three Lions side, and it looks a far cry from theAzzurri outfit that eventually triumphed 2-1 that night in June. England's philosophy and style of play is truly taking shape underHodgson now, whereas Italy seem stuck between two managers and two ideas.
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The visitors will attack anyone now, that much is clear, but the thought process behind each move is more deliberate, and the approach is well-understood by the players. It won't be reckless in Turin fromHodgson's men, but they won't sit in and defend.
It's an opportunity to test their newfound system against a world-class defence; beating Switzerland's Steve von Bergen and Lithuania's amateur-esque line is one thing, but how about Giorgio Chiellini and Co.?
Key Point 2: 1 vs. 1 at the Back
The combination up front is, as yet, unclear, but Conte should select a 3-5-2 formation, which plays two proper strikers. One will drop in to an extent and link play, but it is a veritable front two.
That means England's centre-backs face the rare proposition of going one vs. one at the back; given the opposition they've played in a weak qualifying group so far, they've only ever come up against one striker for whom they can share the marking responsibility.
Pelle and Ciro Immobile have shown in their brief time together that they can function well as a duo, while Manolo Gabbiadini is playing well for Napoli and could have something to say in the absence of Mario Balotelli.
Phil Jagielka and Smalling are the likelier nods given Jones and GaryCahill played the first game, and they'll need to work out very quickly how they are going to deal with a two-punch combo that both holds the ball up and creates space for secondary runs. If England play without a "proper" holder, it could be a real mano y mano battle.
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