Kick out Ventura, Tavecchio and the dinosaurs! World Cup flops Italy need a revolution

With the Azzurri suffering the ultimate humiliation, it has become clear that the country’s rotten footballing foundations need to be uprooted.

 

Forget North Korea in 1966. Forget South Korea in 2002. Forget New Zealand in 2010. Italy failing to qualify for the 2018 World Cup is the biggest embarrassment in the country's history.
Even before the 0-0 draw against Sweden at San Siro on Monday, it was clear that Italian football was broken. Now, with Italy out of Russia 2018, it's even more obvious. There needs to be a revolution.

Italy coach Giampiero Ventura has received most of the blame for the World Cup qualification fiasco and understandably so. This is a man that has been shown to be completely out of his depth in terms of tactics and team selection, reducing a squad that surprised everyone at Euro 2016 under Antonio Conte to a mentally broken one that can't even beat Macedonia or Sweden.
But the bigger question that needs to be asked is this: Why the hell was Ventura given the job in the first place?

Italy has produced more world-class and innovative coaches in history than any other nation. It boasts top-level managers all over Europe. Last season, three of the continent's five major leagues were won by Italians. Four different Italian coaches have won the English Premier League in the last seven years.

Yet the Italian Football Federation (FIGC) decided to hand over the keys to an old man who turns 70 in January. An old man who has never bossed a big club in a managerial career spanning four decades and who has won one Serie C and two Serie D titles.

Ventura is a provincial football coach who was given the job because of who he knew rather than because of his talent. His appointment is a perfect example of the power wielded by the old Italian establishment. They say football often reflects society and this is a classic case.
But we should not be surprised. After all, the president of the FIGC who hired Ventura, Carlo Tavecchio, is another dinosaur. This is the bigot who described Lazio's Cameroonian midfielder Joseph Minala as some "Opti Poba, who has come here, who previously was eating bananas and now is a first-team player for Lazio".