Inter Milan went to Aspmyra and was sent home with a football lesson. When the same thing happened at San Siro in the second leg and a total of 2-5 loss against Bodø/Glimt, it is not weather, wind and artificial turf that decides. A few weeks later, Bayern Munich takes another Serie A club on a masterclass in the Champions League, which did not stop until a 1-6 loss to Atalanta. When you add that the Italian national team in two World Cup qualifying matches was at times outplayed by Norway, there is a cry of crisis in Italy. Nemanja Matic has rounds in the Premier League, Ligue 1 and Serie A, he believes the problem is traced back to the academies. Keywords are the 1990s.
“Football (in Italy) has been standing since the 1990s. The first problem concerns the academies. I’ve seen it with my son – the youth sectors in England and France are very far ahead. They teach you to dribble, develop your technique and encourage you to have fun, while you try to find the right solutions,” Matic begins in an interview with La Gazzetta dello Sport.
READ: Optimistic push to bring two of the biggest Bodø/Glimt stars to the Premier League
“Another topic is tactics, which is important, but takes up too much. In Italy, many teams play with three defenders and attack too little. You say it lacks intensity, but how would that be, when you’re primarily defending in your own half?”
“There is a need for an innovative project, otherwise the situation will be even worse in a few years. And that makes me sad, because I am now part of Italian football and would like to see it on a different level,” Matic concludes in contact with Serie A club Sassuolo.
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Learning not to have fun. The main focus is on defending their own half of the field. Sounds like the opposite of what Kjetil Knutsen and the Bodø/Glimt players practice. We guess it is not only Como coach Cesc Fabregas who will take a study trip to Bodø in the coming year.
