The Italian European Championship begins with a reverse record: last in delivering to UEFA the official list of 26 players for the traveling event at the end of the ultimatum. It was impossible to go beyond midnight and our coach touched midnight: a profound reflection that translated into two innovations with respect to the very latest indications.
The young Giacomo Raspadori enters the blue group, on the 120 ‘field on Monday evening in Ljubljana in the duel between the blue and Portugal who denied us the semifinals of the European category: the Sassuolo striker likes Mancini because he is a number nine different in the movements compared to the two loyal Immobile and Belotti. The Neapolitan Politano, brilliant protagonist in the test with San Marino in Cagliari last Friday, but who came off the radar of the coach because as attacking outsiders, Italy already has more than one choice, pays for the choice that fell on Raspadori. Small revolution also in midfield where Pessina is excluded, whose prices were in sharp rise: among the twenty-six, on the other hand, both the Roma player Cristante and the Inter player Sensi, like Verratti not yet in the best of physical condition. The ballot in defense between the Atalantino Toloi and the Giallorossi Mancini is won by the former thanks to his tactical flexibility.
Mancini chooses not to call reserves, but to focus exclusively on the group that will continue to work in Coverciano waiting for the last friendly test on Friday in Bologna against the Czech Republic one week before the start of the European Championship against Turkey in Rome. Among the nine defenders, in addition to the aforementioned Toloi, there are senators Chiellini and Bonucci, Emerson Palmieri, Spinazzola, Florenzi, Acerbi, Bastoni and Di Lorenzo. There in the middle, in addition to Cristante, Sensi and Verratti, space for Barella, Locatelli, Lorenzo Pellegrini and Jorginho. In attack, Belotti, Immobile and Raspadori as central strikers plus Chiesa, Berardi, Insigne and Bernardeschi. Never a blue coach had waited for the midnight bell to dissolve his reserves: it happened with Mancini engaged in a very difficult match for the blue “cuts”. Closing the door to the lively and eclectic Pessina and doing the same with the fittest of the Politano company was not easy: Raspadori, in Mancio’s thoughts, can become the wild card capable of mixing up European games if needed.
HERE IS THE LIST OF THE 26 CALLED UP AND THE JERSEY NUMBERS:
Goalkeepers: 21 Gianluigi Donnarumma (Milan), 26 Alex Meret (Naples), 1 Salvatore Sirigu (Turin)
Defenders: 15 Francesco Acerbi (Lazio), 23 Alessandro Bastoni (Inter), 19 Leonardo Bonucci (Juventus), 3 Giorgio Chiellini (Juventus), 2 Giovanni Di Lorenzo (Naples), 13 Emerson Palmieri (Chelsea), 24 Alessandro Florenzi (Paris Saint Germain ), 4 Leonardo Spinazzola (Rome), 25 Rafael Toloi (Atalanta)
Midfielders: 18 Nicolò Barella (Inter), 16 Bryan Cristante (Rome), 8 Frello Jorge Luiz Jorginho (Chelsea), 5 Manuel Locatelli (Sassuolo), 7 Lorenzo Pellegrini (Rome), 12 Stefano Sensi (Inter), 6 Marco Verratti (Paris Saint Germain)
Forwards: 9 Andrea Belotti (Turin), 11 Domenico Berardi (Sassuolo), 20 Federico Bernardeschi (Juventus), 14 Federico Chiesa (Juventus), 17 Ciro Immobile (Lazio), 10 Lorenzo Insigne (Naples), 22 Giacomo Raspadori (Sassuolo)
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