“It’s all the clubs’ fault. It’s all the presidents’ fault. The big teams don’t let Italians play”. And populism begins. The noisy, resounding and unsuccessful elimination of Italy from Euro 2024 opens the usual sterile and ridiculous debate on the foreign-loving nature of Italian football. Since the wind carries away words, it is right to analyze with numbers and statistics what Spalletti’s choices have been and above all who are “callable” and who has been called up by Spalletti, comparing them to other big national teams with big championships (England, Spain and Germany). Starting from Italy, the five teams qualified for the next Champions League, namely Inter, Milan, Juventus, Bologna and Atalanta have made many players available for the national team. With the exception of Milan (perhaps only Calabria callable), from Inter to Atalanta there are many “callable”. As many as six of them were coached by Inzaghi (Darmian, Bastoni, Dimarco, Frattesi and Barella plus the injured Acerbi), at least five in Juventus (Gatti, Cambiaso, Fagioli, Chiesa plus the uncalled Locatelli), two or three in Bologna (in addition to the called Calafiori, the excluded Orsolini and the young Fabbian) and 4-5 of Atalanta (Carnesecchi and Scamacca called up, Zappacosta and Ruggeri very good starters and not called up plus the injured Scalvini). We are talking about a total of 18-19 players that can only be called up by four teams (12 of whom have been called up), to which we can add the approximately ten players who can be called up among the two Roman teams qualified for the Europa League (Mancini, Cristante, Pellegrini, El Shaarawy and Zaccagni called up, Spinazzola, Provedel, Romagnoli and Immobile left at home, future-proof Baldanzi, Bove, Rovella and Casale). In short, only with the teams that arrived among the first seven it was possible to easily draw up a list of 25-30 players called up, to which we can add players who also play abroad (Donnarumma, Vicario and Zaniolo) or who are returning from difficult seasons like Napoli with Meret, Di Lorenzo, Politano and Raspadori. And the others?
The top “anti-national” championships
Analyzing the teams qualified for the next Champions League from the Premier League, the numbers are all in Italy’s favour. The champion City has given continuity to four Englishmen (Stones, Walker and Foden plus the uncapped Grealish), Arteta has made three Englishmen players in his Arsenal (Saka and Rice starting with Southgate, White remaining in London), only two in Liverpool Klopp with Alexander-Arnold and Joe Gomez called up by Southgate and two from Aston Villa (Konsa and Watkins). Translated: eleven English players protagonists, nine called up against the at least 20 identified in the big Italian teams. Overwhelming numbers. Numbers that are even more overwhelming if we analyze the four who qualified for the Champions League from the Spanish La Liga. European champion Real Madrid offers “only” three players in De La Fuente, Carvajal, Nacho and Joselu, two of these three considered reserves by Ancelotti. Four called up by Barcelona (Fermin Lopez, Pedri, Yamal and Ferran Torres), only one by Atletico Madrid (Morata) and none by Girona, for a total of eight players called up by the four teams that will be protagonists in the Champions League. The only national team that really makes a difference from this point of view is the Bundesliga, with even 18 players called up by Nagelsmann from the five German teams that will play in the Champions League (three from Bayer Leverkusen, five from Stuttgart, five from Bayern Munich, two from Leipzig and three from Borussia Dortmund). The numbers speak for themselves, Italian clubs have provided many players to Spalletti, more than they did in the Premier League or La Liga. We can discuss the quality of individuals, we can discuss subjective things. Not objectivity. And the objective data clearly demonstrates that Serie A has provided many Italians to Spalletti for this European Championship. If you want to change Italian football, do it by targeting the right problem.
