The Azzurri are set to play their final three matches of 2020, with a friendly against Estonia coming up on Wednesday 11 November prior to two UEFA Nations League matches against Poland and Bosnia & Herzegovina on Sunday 15 November and Wednesday 18 November respectively.

After playing out two draws against Poland and the Netherlands in October, the Azzurri are currently in second place behind the Poles in League A Group 1. In the final two matches, a place in the Final Four will be up for grabs. The next three matches will also be decisive as far as the FIFA ranking is concerned: the top ten European national teams will be seeded for the draw for qualifying to Qatar 2022. Italy are currently twelfth in the world ranking and the seventh best European side.

Head Coach Roberto Mancini has called up 41 players, with Atalanta midfielder Matteo Pessina and Milan defender Davide Calabria earning their first call-ups. Meanwhile, Bologna midfielder Roberto Soriano is back involved four and a half years on from his last call-up. Domenico Criscito (October 2018) and Pietro Pellegri, who was called up for the first and only time in September 2018, will also be returning to the Italy setup.

As a result of positive COVID-19 cases at Fiorentina, Genoa, Inter, Lazio, Roma and Sassuolo, players from these six clubs will only be able to join up with the squad once they have received permission from the relevant health authorities. Donnarumma, Meret, Bonucci, Florenzi, Jorginho, Chiesa, Insigne and Kean will be able to join the training camp on the evening of Tuesday 10 November. The group will meet up tomorrow at the Coverciano Federal Training Centre, where they will stay until 14 November, the day they’ll head to Reggio Emilia for their match against Poland. After the showdown with the Poles, the Azzurri will immediately return to Florence, and, on 17 November, they’ll depart for Sarajevo. They’ll make their way back to Italy straight after their game against Bosnia.

Roberto Mancini’s side are currently unbeaten in 19 matches: over the past two years, the team have picked up 14 wins and five draws (their last defeat came in Losbon on 18 September 2018). Italy’s record since Mancini took charge reads as follows: 15 wins, seven draws and two defeats. The Azzurri have led for 753 minutes of those matches (out of 2160 minutes, 34.86%), while they have been level and behind for 1202 and 205 minutes respectively. During these 24 fixtures, the team’s average age has been 26.58. 73 players have been called up by the Head Coach, 57 have taken to the pitch and 27 have made their debuts. Italy have done very well on the goalscoring front too: the Azzurri have found the net 54 times through 26 players (an average of 2.25 per game, the highest in the history of the National Team), with Belotti being the most prolific player in front of goal with five. In defence, the National Team have conceded just 14 (an average of 0.58 per match: only Vicini’s Italy side can boast at having a better record) over the past two and a half years, while they’ve kept twelve clean sheets in 24 games. The Azzurri’s recent clean sheet streak came to an end against the Dutch: from Dzeko’s 58th-minute goal in Italy vs. Bosnia & Herzegovina to Van de Beek’s 25th-minute finish in Italy vs. the Netherlands, Mancini’s men went 326 minutes without conceding.

ITALY VS. ESTONIA. Italy and Estonia are set to face each other for the seventh time. It’ll be the first friendly between the sides: they have previously only met in European (four times) and World Cup qualifying (twice). The Azzurri emerged victorious in all these clashes, scoring 16 and conceding two. Roberto Mancini scored his last Azzurri goal against the Estonians. So far, Italy have hosted Estonia in Modena, Salerno and Trieste. The Azzurri have enjoyed great success in Florence, where the friendly will be held, recording 20 wins and seven draws (63 goals scored compared to 19 against) from 27 matches. The team’s draw with Bosnia & Herzegovina interrupted a run of six consecutive wins.

ITALY VS. POLAND. Italy and Poland have met on 17 occasions, with the Azzurri’s record against the Poles reading as follows: six wins, eight draws and three defeats. The National Team are yet to be defeated by the Poles on Italian turf (three wins and three draws). The last encounter between the sides was the recent showdown in Gdańsk, which finished in a 0-0 stalemate. The Azzurri will be playing in Reggio Emilia for the third time, a place where they’ve previously won two in two: in 1995, a Zola hat-trick helped Italy on their way to a 4-0 win over Lithuania in their qualifying campaign for Euro 1996, while, three years ago, the National Team ran out narrow winners against Israel just a few days after their defeat to Spain in Madrid, a result which meant that the Azzurri needed to emerge victorious in a playoff showdown in order to qualify for the 2018 World Cup (they went on to lose over two legs against Sweden).

BOSNIA & HERZEGOVINA VS. ITALY. Against Bosnia & Herzegovina, the Azzurri have won twice, drawn once and lost on one occasion. The National Team came up against the Bosnians in Euro 2020 qualifying, coming from behind to win 2-1 in Turin and running out comfortable 3-0 winners in Zenica. Earlier on during the current Nations League campaign, the two sides played out a 1-1 draw. The teams will be coming up against each other for the second time in Sarajevo, where the Azzurri suffered a shock defeat against the newly formed Bosnian national team in 1996. Just a few weeks later, Sacchi left his role as the Azzurri Head Coach.

Squad list

Goalkeepers: Alessio Cragno (Cagliari), Gianluigi Donnarumma (Milan)**, Alex Meret (Napoli)**, Salvatore Sirigu (Torino);
Defenders: Francesco Acerbi (Lazio)*, Cristiano Biraghi (Fiorentina)*, Leonardo Bonucci (Juventus)**, Davide Calabria (Milan), Domenico Criscito (Genoa)*, Danilo D’Ambrosio (Inter)*, Giovanni Di Lorenzo (Napoli), Emerson Palmieri Dos Santos (Chelsea), Alessandro Florenzi (Paris Saint Germain)**, Gianluca Mancini (Roma)*, Angelo Obinze Ogbonna (West Ham), Luca Pellegrini (Genoa)*, Alessio Romagnoli (Milan), Leonardo Spinazzola (Roma)*,
Midfielders: Nicolò Barella (Inter)*, Gaetano Castrovilli (Fiorentina)*, Bryan Cristante (Roma)*, Roberto Gagliardini (Inter)*, Frello Jorge Luiz Jorginho (Chelsea), Manuel Locatelli (Sassuolo)*, Lorenzo Pellegrini (Roma)*, Matteo Pessina (Atalanta), Roberto Soriano (Bologna), Sandro Tonali (Milan);
Forwards: Andrea Belotti (Torino), Domenico Berardi (Sassuolo)*, Federico Bernardeschi (Juventus), Francesco Caputo (Sassuolo)*, Federico Chiesa (Juventus)**, Stephan El Shaarawy (Shanghai Shenua), Vincenzo Grifo (Friburgo), Ciro Immobile (Lazio)*, Lorenzo Insigne (Napoli)**, Moise Bioty Kean (Paris Saint Germain)**, Kevin Lasagna (Udinese), Riccardo Orsolini (Bologna), Pietro Pellegri (Monaco);

* will only join up with the squad after receiving permission from the relevant health authorities

**will join the training camp by 22:00 CET on Tuesday 10 November

Schedule (all times CET)

Sunday 8 November
Meet-up at the Federal Technical Centre in Coverciano

Monday 9 November
11:00 – Training at the Federal Technical Centre in Coverciano

Tuesday 10 November
14:30 – Press conference (Head Coach and a player) at the Stadio Artemio Franchi in Florence
17:45 – Estonia press conference (Head Coach and player) at the Stadio Artemio Franchi in Florence
18:15 – Italy training session at the Federal Technical Centre in Coverciano
18:30 –Estonia training session (media access for the first 15 minutes) at the Stadio Artemio Franchi in Florence

Wednesday 11 November
20:45 – ITALY vs. Estonia (media duties after the match)

Thursday 12 November
15:30 – Training (behind closed doors) at the Federal Technical Centre in Coverciano

Friday 13 November
13:45 – Press event (players) in the auditorium of the Federal Technical Centre in Coverciano

16:00 – Training (behind closed doors) at the Federal Technical Centre in Coverciano

Saturday 14 November
11:30 – Journey from Florence to Reggio Emilia
16:30 – Poland press conference at the Stadio Città del Tricolore in Reggio Emilia
17:00 – Poland training session (media access for the first 15 minutes) at the Stadio Città del Tricolore in Reggio Emilia
18:00 – Italy press conference at the Stadio Città del Tricolore in Reggio Emilia
18:30 – Italy training session (media access for the first 15 minutes) at the Stadio Città del Tricolore in Reggio Emilia

Sunday 15 November
20:45 – ITALY vs. Poland (post-match press event and subsequent return to the Federal Technical Centre in Coverciano

Monday 16 November
16:30 – Training session (behind closed doors) at the Federal Technical Centre in Coverciano

Tuesday 17 November
10:45 – Journey from Florence to Sarajevo
16:30 – Bosnia & Herzegovina press conference at the Grbavica Stadium in Sarajevo
17:00 –Bosnia & Herzegovina training session (media access for the first 15 minutes) at the Grbavica Stadium in Sarajevo
17:30 – Italy press conference at the Grbavica Stadium in Sarajevo
18:00 – Italy training session (media access for the first 15 minutes) at the Grbavica Stadium in Sarajevo

Wednesday 18 November
20:45 – Bosnia & Herzegovina vs. ITALY post-match press event and subsequent return to Italy