After a hard-won victory against Moldova, Rino Gattuso there was anger in the Rai Sport microphone at the end of the match in Chisinau. Ninety minutes of agony and missed chances, then two headers, from Mancini and Pio Esposito, gave Italy their fifth win of the new season at the end. With a quarter of an hour remaining, background chants from a small group of fans followed (“go to work”) when the 0-0 score remained unsolved, it sparked Ringhio’s anger.
First he attacked fans for chants against his Italy and then he criticized the new qualifying formula for the World Cup which favors teams with no football tradition. Here are Gattuso’s words after the match: “I heard what the fans said, it’s a shame they told us to go to work – said the Italian coach to Rai –It’s a shame: I didn’t accept it but we moved on. I saw Italy play, they never had a shot on goal. I’m very satisfied, if you stay 11-1 against Norway, that’s your problem.”
The coach then also talked about the qualification formula. Now Italy must win 9-0 against Norway on Sunday night at San Siro to avoid the playoffs, which is frankly impossible:“In ’94 there were two Africans, now eight. In my day, the best European runners-up went straight to the World Cup…”. Then he returned to the game: “I’m very satisfied, we did what we had to do, gave playing time to many players. There were no easy games, the opponents never had a shot on goal. We know what our goal is and we move forward like this: it’s time to stick together, the team fights on the pitch.”
At this point Italy is confident of qualifying for the play-offs. The ‘European’ qualifying play-offs will be determined on Thursday 20 November, when the draw will be held in Zurich, Switzerland, with Italy placed in the first pot and will therefore challenge the team from the fourth pot in the semi-finals. Twelve qualifying group runners-up will take part in the playoffs plus four Nations League group winners, who if they have qualified will be replaced by the other best ranked national team in the competition. Each national team will play a semifinal and, possibly, a final, both in single matches. Matches are scheduled for March 26 (semi-finals) and March 31 (finals) 2026.
Italy could meet in the semifinals one of the ‘saviors’ of the Nations League, namely Wales, Romania, Northern Ireland and Sweden, who eliminated the Azzurri in the 2017 play-off round.
Along with the Azzurri, the first pot of the draw will consist of Turkey, Ukraine and Poland, while in the second pot there will be the Czech Republic, Hungary, Slovakia and Scotland. In third place is North Macedonia who eliminated the Azzurri in 2022, Albania, Bosnia and Kosovo.
