LEO THE LION
Azzurri skipper: We’ll copy England to bounce back from Year Zero
ITALY captain Leonardo Bonucci last night admitted the pain of missing the World Cup finals will only hit home this summer.
And the Milan defender urged his country to copy England’s policy of blooding youngsters as the Azzurri return from ‘close to Year Zero’.
The chaos following November’s play-off defeat to Sweden has left the fourtime World Cup winners without a full-time coach or a head of their FA.
And top players such as Bonucci, who wins his 77th cap at Wembley tonight, will be frustrated spectators.
“It will be hard and this is when what happened will really hit home – we will be at home watching the World Cup on the telly rather than playing in it,” he said.
“It hurts, but also from a personal point of view you never stop learning so playing in a World Cup is important – you become a better player.
“But there is no point in looking back, we need to look forward. The World Cup will come and go and we need to work to get Italy back to where it used to be.”
Milan’s 19-year-old keeper Gianluigi Donnarumma (right) will take the place of 40-year-old Gigi Buffon tonight as Italy look to the future. But Bonucci (below) warned: “We are undergoing big changes and returning to win straight away will be difficult. “People need to understand Italy restarts not from zero but close to zero so patience is the key. Tomorrow we will meet a nation which has managed to rebuild with young, talented players, They’ve a lot of experience at international level.
“You can’t compare our players born in 1993, 1994, 1995, 1996, 1997 to the England players born in the same years. Our young players have less experience and apart from the top two in Serie A, they play less in Europe than Premier League teams. But I still think we have a good chance to give England problems.” Caretaker boss Luigi Di Biagio started his tenure with a 2-0 defeat to Argentina as Italy went three matches without scoring for the first time since 2012. Claudio Ranieri, who said he had not been contacted about the full-time job, yesterday lamented there was no “super champion like Riva, Del Piero, Totti, Baggio, Boninsegna” in the current Italy squad. The former Leicester coach called for Mario Balotelli to be given another chance.
“He makes the difference here in France,” said the Nantes boss. “There are good goalscorers in Italy but Mario needs a chance to see if he has matured once and for all.”