Italy’s quest to the World Cup is yet again, through a playoff

CHIÅžINÇU, Moldova — When big nations fail, the pressure can be intense, and another FIFA World Cup nightmare is threatening to engulf Italy. The Azzurri haven’t even missed out on the 2026 World Cup yet, but discontent is already boiling over.

Federico Dimarco couldn’t wait to get off the pitch at the end of a late, but meaningless, 2-0 win against Moldova and his Italy teammates and coach Gennaro Gattuso weren’t far behind, none of them acknowledging the 400 Italy supporters who had made the trip to ChiÈinău.

Protests against the Italian Federation and chants directed at the players and Gattuso, who has only been in charge of the team since June, prompted the coach to hit back at the traveling fans and highlight the pressure that the coach and squad are under.

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“This is not the time to tell the players to go get a job,” Gattuso said.

“Honestly, I don’t accept the fans’ jeering. Now we all need to stay united.”

It was a sixth win in seven games in Group I of UEFA World Cup qualifying for Italy, but 2-0 was nowhere near enough on a night when they needed to hammer the bottom team in the group as it leaves the four-time world champions — only Brazil have won more World Cups — needing to beat Norway by nine goals in Milan on Sunday to qualify for the World Cup for the first time since 2014.

Having taken 88 minutes to break the deadlock against Moldova in ChiÈinău thanks to Gianluca Mancini‘s header, it is beyond the realms of any possibility that Italy will score nine without reply against a Norway side with a 100% winning record in the group, so the Italians are facing the lottery of the playoff again.

Sweden eliminated Italy in the playoff for the 2018 World Cup, and North Macedonia denied them a place at the 2022 World Cup. Both nations are potential opponents this time around in Thursday’s playoff draw, if Italy fail to score those nine goals against Norway.

The futile scenario in front of them explains why Dimarco and his teammates left the field so quickly after the final whistle. They know the fate awaiting them and the pressure they will be under to avoid the ignominy of Italy, one of the sport’s great nations, missing out on a third successive World Cup, having qualified for the previous 14.

“In my day, the best runners-up went straight to the World Cup; now the rules have changed,” Gattuso said.

“To change the rules, you need to tell those who organize these tournaments.

“If we look at South America, where six out of 10 teams go directly to the World Cup and the seventh heads into a playoff with a team from Oceania, that does give you regrets. That is the disappointment. The system needs to change in Europe.”

Maybe so, but perhaps Italy also needs to do better because Germany, Spain, England and France, their fellow European heavyweights, haven’t had the same trouble qualifying for the World Cup in recent campaigns. Italy’s 3-0 defeat away to Norway at the outset of the qualification campaign, which cost coach Luciano Spalletti his job, was clearly damaging for the Azzurri.

Unless they score several goals against Norway, Italy will look to qualify for the World Cup via a playoff for a third straight time. (Photo by DANIEL MIHAILESCU/AFP via Getty Images)

But with goal difference (goals scored minus goals conceded) designated as the first tie-breaker in the event of teams being level on points — rather than head-to-head results — there should have been ample time for that loss in Oslo to be overcome.

But Norway’s relentless winning run has been built on emphatic victories, including an 11-1 home win against Moldova and a 5-0 victory in ChiÈinău. Those scorelines alone boosted their goal difference by 15 goals.

So, despite being flawless since losing against Norway, with five successive wins in Group I, Italy just couldn’t keep pace with the Norwegian goal machine.

Erling Haaland has scored 14 goals in the qualifying stages, nine more than Italy’s leading scorer in the group, Mateo Retegui, and just four fewer than Italy had scored in six games ahead of kickoff in Moldova.

Rather than this being a story of Italian failure, it is really one of Norway being exceptional, and the result remains the same as in the qualifiers for 2018 and 2022: Italy, barring a miracle in Milan on Sunday, face the playoff again.

But they had the opportunity against Moldova to at least give themselves a chance of pulling off a remarkable escape in the final game against Norway.

A big win — a win more emphatic than their record victory of 9-0 against the United States in 1948 — would have given Gattuso’s side faint hope of the emphatic victory against Stale Solbakken’s side that would seal top spot and qualification.

When the Italy players boarded the team bus to travel the four miles from their ChiÈinău hotel to the stadium, Norway were being held 0-0 at halftime by Estonia, but by the time the Italians arrived at Stadionul Zimbru just 20 minutes later, Norway were 4-0 ahead and any hope of dropped points and their qualification destiny being back in Italy’s hands had evaporated.

So Italy knew they had to beat both Moldova and Norway with a 19-goal swing in their favor. Still, Moldova had conceded 26 goals in six games and they aren’t ranked 156th in the world — sandwiched between Singapore and Puerto Rico — for nothing.

But Italy’s task was so ridiculously unrealistic that it made their players too desperate to score and, at the same time, emboldened Moldova to raise their game to previously unseen levels.

As a consequence, Italy’s goalless first half was a comedy of errors. They had 13 shots on goal — nine from inside the penalty area — and failed to score with any of them. But had it not been a wayward finish by Moldova center forward Virgiliu Postolachi after 33 minutes, Italy would have suffered the ignominy of going behind.

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Despite their surprisingly high FIFA World Ranking of ninth place, Italy are nothing more than a functional team. They lack star quality, perhaps except midfielders Sandro Tonali and Giacomo Raspadori, and coach Gattuso hinted before the game that Liverpool forward Federico Chiesa had declined a call-up for the Moldova and Norway games.

“I must respect what the player tells me,” Gattuso told reporters.

While Chiesa opted to remain in England, Gattuso chose not to select Brentford full back Michael Kayode, whose long throws may have been crucial against Moldova, especially with the tall forward Gianluca Scamacca restored to the team after a two-year injury battle.

But Gattuso, Italy’s sixth manager since Cesare Prandelli oversaw their last World Cup appearance in 2014, has a winning record in charge, so he can point to those results as justification for his selections.

He will know, however, that his team must improve if they are to reach the World Cup. They ended up having 28 chances in ChiÈinău, but only scored two of them — Mancini’s header and Pio Esposito‘s strike in stoppage time — so Gattuso needs Moise Kean to return from injury and he may have to persuade Chiesa to make himself available again.

With those two players back in the fold and Arsenal defender Riccardo Calafiori back to fitness, Italy will be stronger. But as Gattuso and his players boarded the 1:30 a.m. flight back to Malpensa Airport in Milan, less than two hours after the final whistle, they will have done so with apprehension of what lies ahead.

The World Cup playoffs have become a series of horror films for Italy, and they need to change the ending.

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