Spalletti's words, Gravina's silences

OSLO - The silence. Even more resounding while the 25 thousand Vikings shouted their joy in the bowl of the Ullevaal Stadion, and while the feeble and subdued voice of Luciano Spalletti tried to explain the reasons for the defeat. No word, however, came from Gabriele Gravina, president of the Football Federation reconfirmed (the only candidate) at the beginning of the year. The man, Gravina, who led the FIGC to the European success of 2021, but also during the flops of the failure to qualify for Qatar2022 and Euro2024, just last summer. And so, in the absence of explicit declarations (which even on the night of Oslo would have been dutiful, necessary, and ultimately also useful) it is that silence that speaks, which must also be interpreted in some way.

Bench at risk - These are decisive hours for the bench of our National team (that is the true symbol and emblem of Italian football, more than clubs now owned by foreign funds and composed of players from the five continents). Luciano Spalletti has made mistakes but also - he cannot fail to be recognized - his face: both in taking responsibility for the Norwegian collapse, and in indicating the wrong attitude and attitude of at least part of an Azzurri group also shaped and selected by him.

The coach will want to talk about this with his first point of contact, Gravina himself, in these hours. But obviously the conversation will be wide-ranging, because Spalletti will ask for more support, closeness, compactness to face the next very difficult months, a long purgatory that will have as its only possible landing place the Caudine Forks of the World Cup playoffs. But Gravina's silence in Oslo may make one think that this support for the coach is fading, together with those convictions that in August two years ago brought him to the Azzurri bench, after the triumph in the championship at the helm of Napoli and in place of the resigning Roberto Mancini.

Scenarios and names - It goes without saying that the most immediate effect of the silence of the number one of the FIGC is to unleash the guessing game, which was already going wild at the final whistle of the Ullevaal massacre, and which became even more credible and detailed on the return flights from Oslo to Milan, Rome and Florence (destination Coverciano). Who could succeed Spalletti now, right now, even before Monday, or immediately after the match in Reggio Emilia with Moldova?

There are those who hypothesize the great ex, Rino Gattuso model, controversial career as a center coach, but coming from a formative experience in the Croatian championship, and who knows everything about the blue environment; those who venture the sensational return of Roberto Mancini, who even in the last hours has repeatedly admitted the mistake of presumption made two years ago, and which pushed him to leave the bench he loved most; those who - finally - advance the most credible and reasonable hypothesis, that of the arrival at Coverciano of Claudio Ranieri, the Great Adjuster, who after the extraordinary championship played with Roma (led from the relegation zone to one step away from Champions League qualification), and once Gasperini has been placed on the Giallorossi bench, could accept yet another challenge to definitively crown his inimitable career.