Italy manager Luciano Spaletti has blamed a Serie A club for his side’s embarrassing exit from Euro 2024.
The knockout stages of the 2024 European Championships got underway on Saturday night, as defending champions Italy faced Switzerland, one of the dark horses of the tournament so far.
And Switzerland lived up to their label, as they comfortably dispatched Italy in a 2-0 victory at Berlin's Olympiastadion.
And after the match, Italy manager Spaletti had a bizarre excuse for the disappointing performance of his side.
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“Inter won Serie A and then I made sure they are a very professional, serious club because Simone Inzaghi kept training the team in a certain way," he explained.
"I was in touch with how often Inter were training, but perhaps you are subconsciously not as applied when you have won the league so early."
The 65-year-old manager suggested that, after winning the Italian league with a victory over local rivals AC Milan in April, Inter Milan players in the national team did not train hard enough ahead of the Euro 2024 campaign.
Five players in the national team squad come from the Serie A champions, with three of them starting the match against Switzerland.
But, the lack of training for Inter Milan’s players was not the only reason for Italy’s failure given by Spaletti.
“I need to get to know my team a bit better,” he added.
“We also had a number of players who suffered injuries, players I was counting on, and you saw that in terms of intensity we were under par.
“The future of the Italian national team comes down to different choices. We need more physicality. When you think you can play with quality, but then you can’t sustain that intensity over 90 minutes, you need to try and mix things up.”
Spaletti will now face pressure over his future as Italy manager, ahead of the team’s opening Nations League fixture against France in September.
And former England striker Gary Lineker believes this pressure is justified, as he was damning in his review of the match.
Speaking on the BBC, he said: "I don't think I've witnessed, in my lifetime, a worse Italian team than this.”
Switzerland will discover their quarter-final opponents on Sunday evening, with the winner of England's match with Slovakia set to meet them in the next round.
In the other match of the evening, hosts Germany defeated Denmark 2-0 at BVB Stadion Dortmund, following weather issues which temporarily halted the match.
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Topics: Italy, Euro 2024, Switzerland, Inter Milan, Serie A, Gary Lineker, Football
Ben McCrum