For Spalletti's Italy it's a defeat in Oslo against Norway. And the 2026 World Cup is already far away

OSLO - Overwhelmed and abandoned. It is the Italy of Oslo, which will perhaps enter the history of our football just like this, because this night will be difficult to forget, from a footballing perspective, even if it is added to the many bitter ones already experienced by this team in the last twenty years, with the exception of the European ride of 2021, which today perhaps hurts even more to remember. Overwhelmed by Haaland and his teammates, who thus put more than one mortgage on direct qualification for the tripartite World Cup 2026; abandoned by many, too many players (who discover they are touchy, susceptible or simply painful precisely on the days in which they have to wear the blue) and by a football system that increasingly struggles to hide its contradictions and its own rancor (to say the least inelegant and inappropriate, to be explicit, the presentation of the Serie A calendar two hours before this challenge, to which many of the blue hopes for the World Cup were linked). In short, the conditions for defeat were all there, and they promptly materialized, above and beyond the faults of a Luciano Spalletti whose nervous smiles and venomous jokes of these days clearly let us glimpse fears and nervousness. On Monday we host Moldova, the first stop in that long purgatory that will lead us to the playoffs, given that it seems frankly unthinkable that this Italy can overturn the defeat at the Ullevaal Stadion on November 16, when the Norwegians will visit us.

Hugs and shivers – The Norwegians have been to the World Cup three times (1938-1994-1998); they have met us three times; they have lost three times. It is therefore normal that the desire for revenge of the team led by Stale Solbakken (on the field in '98 in Marseille in the match decided by Vieri; his son plays for Pisa) is decidedly significant. During the warm-up – also this one in pouring rain – the hosts form a circle and hug each other; in the meantime we set our eyes on Diego Coppola, born in 2003, 193 centimetres, making his debut after a good championship with Verona and good performances in the Under21s. He will be directly linked with Erling Haaland. In the meantime, the fiery Norwegians are making that cauldron that is the Ullevaal Stadion boil, 25 thousand seats sold out for days for the match with the Azzurri. A special spectator in the grandstand was King Harald V himself.

We have the ball, they have the goals – Luciano Spalletti chooses to start with Raspadori as the starter and Frattesi on the bench, thus launching a 3-5-1-1 with the aim of having the two-time Scudetto winner from Naples support the top scorer in Serie A, Retegui; but also wanting to ensure greater linearity in a midfield that sees Barella and Tonali as mezzali around the direction of Rovella. The Norwegians willingly leave us the ball, ready to press on every little uncertainty, and in the 10th minute Nusa frees himself from Zappacosta and heads towards Donnarumma: Bastoni closes down and almost on the restart a dangerous action with Raspadori occurs. But the error comes four minutes later: Bastoni himself makes a bad pass towards Zappacosta, Nusa intercepts and passes it to Sorloth on the edge of offside: Coppola fails to close down, and the Atletico Madrid striker fools Donnarumma with a left-footed touch from close range.

Collapse - Norway ahead, and Spalletti's scowling look clearly and dramatically photographs the Azzurri's moment. Solbakken's men are playing 'Italian style', while we, despite having a large amount of ball possession, are unable to create any danger near Nyland: the first shot is a high diagonal from Raspadori in the 25th minute. The plot of the match seems to be defined: in the 31st minute, again on a mistake this time by Di Lorenzo, Odegaard brings on Sorloth again, and it takes Donnarumma's big hand to save the ball in the corner. But in the 33rd minute Haaland touches his first ball, adjusting a Nyland pass for Nusa: the rest is done by the Leipzig winger: slalom and shot that burns Gigio: 2-0 for them, and the second ball that touches the City centre forward is the one for 3-0, in the 41st minute, also dribbling Donnarumma to score Odegaard's vertical assist. The Vikings now dominate, and for us, reaching the 2026 World Cup, with the journey just begun, already seems very far away. In the second half Berge also hits the post, which adds nothing to the evening. Italy got lost in Oslo, and from here it is really difficult to imagine when (and if) we will ever be able to find it again.