Tribal Football
·7 June 2022
Tribal Football
·7 June 2022
It's a special game for the former Sampdoria defender against his home nation.
He said, “We are fine, the boys have recovered well. Clearly, when there is so little time you don't train and only do recovery work. However, from the various tests it seems the boys have recovered and tomorrow at the start of the game we will be 100%.
“Working as coach, I return to Italy often. I haven't been away from Italy for a long time and when I return to Italy I stay with my family.
“But the emotion is there, because basically after 10 years we have gone from being unknown in Hungary to facing our own national team, Tonight we are still not, although I have met Mancini and his staff, but tomorrow night there will be an uproar."
Rossi continued: “The fact that Italy didn't qualify for the World Cup was a shock for everyone, for us Italians but also for those who aren't. They proved to be a great team and it still are. Unfortunately, they had many adverse episodes that lasted until the match against North Macedonia.
“There had been a few lucky episodes during the European Championship, but after that everything was against them. In Italy, especially in football, we want to be the best, but in this moment we have to accept that we are not the best but among the best.
“Mancini has shown that he has vision and I believe that for the immediate and near future several players who were sent home for various reasons will be part of the national team, but Italy is young and has quality and quantity.
“I, as an Italian fan but also as an insider, would be much less of a pessimist for this failure to qualify for the World Cup."