Italy Under 20 is playing the final of the World Cup. Today is worth it, who knows the future

Not everything is as it seems in youth football and very often generations that seem incredible, ready to transform a very bright present into a radiant and successful future, fail. Obviously the opposite is also true, a colorless present, sometimes disappointing, can turn into an excellent tomorrow. Especially when the Under 20 takes the field, which is none other than the Under-19 that was up until the year before the World Cup in its category is to be played. Italy has gone through difficult moments, made up of failed missions and sensational falls, long disappearances, interspersed with some excellent performances and no victories. He’s trying these days at the Under 20 World Cup in Argentina. The access to the final against South Korea is played out, in a subspecies of revenge, by category, against the Korean national team which made the Azzurri a snub, with the special participation of a certain Byron Moreno, in an edition of the World Cup which will take the field has not even had the opportunity to see: none of them was born in 2002.

The hope for Carmine Nunziata’s boys is to do better than Alberico Evani’s boys did six years ago. Third, after a well-played World Cup, but finished in the semifinals.

The national team was an excellent team. Federico Dimarco, Nicolò Barrella, Riccardo Orsolini, Rolando Mandragora, Matteo Pessina, Andrea Favilli played. The stars were Barrella (who broke his wrist in the second game), Orsolini, Mandragora and Favilli. Only the first, in addition to Pessina, was among the squad for the European Championship that Italy would win a few more later – in 2021. There is time for them to take back the national team, not all of them grow as fast as the new wave of cycling. They lost to England in the semifinals. And that England was very strong, full of talented players. The alleged phenomena of the time have not really become so: Dominic Calvert-Lewin got stuck at Everton, Dominic Solanke is not the goalscorer he was thought he could become, Ainsley Maitland-Niles got lost between Rome and Southampton’s Jonjoe Kenny has not yet become the best right-back in Europe as he was predicted. Better went to Fikayo Tomori and Ademola Lookman, who were good in the national team but not the most anticipated.

It was no different then than today. Few played in Serie A, only Niccolò Barrella was almost but not always a starter, many were owned by the big league players, those who played did it on loan in Serie B or Serie C.

Nothing has changed. This happened to most of the national teams and it still happens.

Today, as then, there are excellent talents, they just have different names and characteristics and someone is already in Roberto Mancini’s national team. Someone will definitely get there.

Simone Pafundi didn’t show much in Argentina, but he’s got a lot of talent and his concentration and determination don’t seem like those of an extra. At Udinese he did a lot of benching and little playing, but the club believes in him and time, at least for him, could be a gentleman. The same can be said for Cesare Casadei, who preferred a rich Erasmus to Chelsea to play his cards, which are many and well matched. Going abroad is a risk only for i madeinitalists who still consider that abroad they do everything to burn our best talents. There’s a lot of competition in the Premier League, but English clubs are interested in money and results, they don’t care much who brings them to them, the nationality of the interpreters is something secondary.

And then there’s Tommaso Baldanzi who is showing the whole world, or at least the interested one, that his football is perhaps old-fashioned, but certainly well done and quite interesting. It’s nice to see Tommaso Baldanzi. He proved it in Serie A, at Empoli. And as usual one would say, because in Empoli the really good ones always find a place. We will see. He has a career ahead of him to prove that really is true.

He’s not the only Baldanzi who is ready to do well, if not everywhere, at least in many places. There is also Matteo Prati. The Spal midfielder in Argentina is demonstrating that you don’t always need to steal the show from everyone to be the best, that sometimes you just need to know how to do your job well to be precious, very precious. His job is that of the management and interdiction midfielder, characteristics that are always needed in a team, any team.

Just be patient, be aware that the world of the under 20 is a world that does not necessarily reflect the future world. But their time is first of all today, there is time to see tomorrow.