The football-crazed fans of Italy have gone through a roller coaster of emotions in 2021. Only recently, the national team won the UEFA Euros 2021 after having England in the final. However, now, they have failed to gain automatic qualification to the FIFA World Cup 2022 and stand on the brink of missing out on Qatar.

Italy lost out on the number one spot in their qualifying group as Switzerland clinched first place. However, Italy’s manager Roberto Mancini has a lot of faith in this mixed bag of a team. Speaking after Italy’s 0-0 draw with Northern Ireland, the former Manchester City manager revealed exactly how highly he rated his side.

“We’ll book our place in the world cup in March and hopefully win the tournament too,” Mancini revealed.

Italy will now compete in the play-offs for World Cup qualification

As a result of Italy’s second-place finish in their group, they will now compete in a playoff tournament in March, where only three out of twelve teams will qualify. Portugal is another big name that failed to qualify for the World Cup after losing to Serbia in their final round game.

The problem with Italy has been the absence of top-class strikers as Lazio’s Ciro Immobile and Torino FC’s Andrea Belotti have both struggled to replicate their club form with the national team. However, Italy has shown that they have the caliber to win it all after their incredible performances in the Euros.

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Roberto Mancini shows his disappointment after Italy’s draw

Despite his confidence in the squad, Mancini was incredibly disappointed with Azzurri’s performances in the qualifying group and said that Italy should have qualified two games ago.

“I am disappointed. We made life complicated for ourselves and qualification should’ve been sealed at least two games ago,” Mancini revealed.

Italy drew four out of their eight qualifying matches and that lack of threat in front of the goal ultimately proved fatal for the former World Cup winners. It’ll be interesting to see what Roberto Mancini can now conjure up to solve this problem and take his squad to Qatar next year.

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