Roberto Mancini goes down flat: “We are worse off than Southgate.”

Roberto Mancini chimes in.

Head coach Roberto Mancini, during the press conference to present the national team’s Euro 2024 qualifying matches (Thursday against England in Naples, Sunday in Malta away), took advantage of a question about Retegui’s call-up to return to the issue regarding the difficulties in the generational turnover of Italian players, especially forwards.

“Years ago I said that footballers born in Italy should play in the national team,” he told reporters, “but this problem was not there yet while in the meantime the world has changed. We are worse off than Southgate (England’s technical commissioner, who had pointed out a similar problem when talking about the massive presence of foreigners in the Premier League, ed.). So if there is a chance to get new players, we take them. Unfortunately, there are few Italians scoring in Serie A.”

Moving on to talk about Retegui, Mancini explained, “We have been following him for some time, he has quality and is young. We hope he can have an important role, he’s a smart kid and can give the team a hand.”