It was reported this week that Milan could send Tiemoue Bakayoko back to Chelsea, and Tom Scholes wonders what’s happened to the talent we saw at Monaco.
Cast your mind back to the 2016/2017 season. Monaco had just become the first team since Montpellier in 2012 to win Ligue 1 and the team to break the Paris Saint-Germain monopoly in France’s top division.
The Serie A title race may be going as predicted, but the fight for the Capocannoniere crown is far more unpredictable.
After the first seven games in Serie A, everything is proceeding as predicted as far as the table is concerned. Juventus have played eight and won eight, have a 13+ goal difference, and has already opened up a six-point gap over Napoli in second place.
However, what isn’t quite going according to the script is the leading goalscorer. Cristiano Ronaldo has long been the odds-on favourite with punters who like to bet on football sites, but at this early stage of the season, he is a little off the pace.
After the passing of the late, great Peter Brackley, Giancarlo Rinaldi pays tribute to the voice of Football Italia.
He was, for many of us, the voice of our Sunday afternoons. If James Richardson laid the table, it was Peter Brackley who served up the sumptuous treats that Serie A in the 1990s had to offer. To hear of his passing inevitably sent the mind spinning back to the golden age of Football Italia.
Italy may have needed a last-gasp winner to beat Poland on Sunday, but Giancarlo Rinaldi was hugely enamoured by what the Azzurri served up in Chorzow...
If there is going to be a renaissance in Italian football, perhaps it was fitting that it should originate in Florence. After what have seemed like interminable Dark Ages for the Azzurri, they finally delivered a performance - and result - to provide hope of a brighter future. It was only right that it was Fiorentina full-back Cristiano Biraghi who popped up with a more-than-merited winning goal from a dominant display. That his celebrations honoured Davide Astori only added to the emotion of this late, late victory in Poland.
Roberto Mancini might want to walk back some of the comments he made about the Nations League, writes Anthony Barbagallo, because football is evolving.
It’s now or never: Italy has to beat Poland this evening to keep their slim chances alive of qualifying for the next round in the UEFA Nations League. To make matters worse, a loss would see the Italians get relegated to League B in this new competition.
The Azzurri have never taken friendly matches particularly seriously, but Gaby McKay says that has to change.
Earlier this year, for the first time in the nation’s illustrious football history, Italy fell outside of the top 20 teams on FIFA’s world rankings.
For a nation which has won the World Cup four times in history, second only to Brazil, it was quite the ignominious fall, if not a surprising one. Giampiero Ventura’s side failed to qualify for the 2018 World Cup, losing to Sweden in a play-off, meaning the Italians were at home for the first time since 1958.
Italy's Under-20 side lost 2-1 to England in a friendly that represented Italian football's overall struggles for identity and style, writes Richard Hall.
Italy’s Under-20 side took on their England counterparts in a rematch of the World Cup semi-final in 2017, a game the English won 3-1. Mill Farm, home of AFC Fylde, a team in England’s fifth tier, hosted the game and the facilities impressed the visitors. Many of the team claimed that this was a stadium that would stand proud in Serie B.
Roberto Mancini has incorporated new faces in the Azzurri setup, but Billy Wilkinson saw a disjointed display against Ukraine.
One of the big criticisms of the Azzurri in recent years has been the seeming reluctance to incorporate new blood into the side. Newly hired Roberto Mancini quickly moved to mend that criticism, with the likes of Lorenzo Insigne, Jorginho and Federico Bernardeschi becoming starters.
That may be a change, but there is one constant: no matter who seems to play in the XI, the performances still remain uninspiring and often clueless, whilst the results often correlate.
As the Azzurri prepare to face Ukraine tonight, Daryl Hammond looks back on the history of the fixture.
"The Italians have a great team and they don't forgive mistakes," said former Ukraine manager Oleg Blokhin. And a ruthless Italy side capitalised on a fair few of them when the sides met on the biggest stage.
In the grand scheme of things, Italy's quarter-final meeting with Ukraine at the 2006 World Cup was a mere speed bump on their way to lifting the famous trophy in Germany.
Luca Toni scored twice as they ran out 3-0 winners, in what was their biggest win of the tournament.
While Sebastian Giovinco’s call-up to the Italian national team is being celebrated across MLS, Marco D’Onofrio explains why it may be a worrying sign for fans of the Azzurri.
Sebastian Giovinco’s Toronto FC were officially eliminated from MLS play-off contention when they fell 2-1 at home against Canadian rivals the Vancouver Whitecaps on Saturday night. Just a year after setting a new league record for most points in a season and lifting the Philip F Anschutz trophy as MLS Cup champions, the Reds didn’t even qualify for the post-season in 2018.
