Roberto Mancini announced his squad for the upcoming Nations League games this evening. Two AC Milan players are included on the list but there is also one notable absentee.
An international break will take place next week, giving some of the players much-needed rest. However, that won’t be the case for Tommaso Pobega and Sandro Tonali as they have been called up by Italy manager Mancini.
On the other hand, Milan’s captain Davide Calabria has been snubbed once again. It’s well known that Mancini isn’t a huge fan of the right-back, but he was expected to make the squad now that Alessandro Florenzi (a Mancini favourite) is injured.
#Nazionale 🇮🇹
I 29 #Azzurri convocati da #Mancini per le gare di #NationsLeague contro #Inghilterra 🏴 e #Ungheria 🇭🇺Il programma 👉🏻 https://t.co/DwFme4PRVw#VivoAzzurro pic.twitter.com/69vj4nRzjs
— Nazionale Italiana ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ (@Azzurri) September 16, 2022
Italy will face Hungary and England in the Nations League during the break. It remains to be seen how much playing time Pobega will get, but Tonali is poised to play a lot for the Azzurri given his importance.
Calabria still needs to step up imo, if Sergino Dest can improve his defending he can easily overtake Calabria for the starting spot
Don’t say that, I got crucified earlier for saying basically the same thing. Experts on these boards believe he is the second coming insted of one of our weakest links.
Calabria is not some legend but he is solid, loyal, and reliable. Dest is whatever. He may have a few games then suck. Calabria is a milanista but clearly you don’t care about that. Any new flavor of the week will do for you it seems. Pathetic.
I’m sure Yoko and Ballo are too if you ask them. Brahim is the greatest Milanista of them all I’m sure, but that don’t make him good.
Calabria might get better, but right now, he is a liability and its costing us.
“Calabria might get better, but right now, he is a liability and its costing us.”. Explain that please. There has been no evidence to suggest that he is even remotely “costing us” and certainly no evidence that can’t equally be placed on any of his teammates. Seems like you are once again passing your opinion as fact but will gladly listen to the opposing argument.
Milan vs Inter – “However, he struggled a few times defensively, including on Dzeko’s goal.”
Atalanta vs Milan – “He perhaps should have been bolder in the attack, especially in the second half when Atalanta left him unmarked”
Milan vs Zagreb – “He was the first man that got beat on the goal, even though that was a rather collective mistake”
Milan vs Udinese – “He won the penalty and also assisted Rebic’s first goal with a smart cross. However, his rating is heavily affected by the many misplaced passes that really highlighted his weaknesses tonight.”
Milan vs Bologna – “Disappointing display from the captain as he seemed like the clear weakness for Milan in defence and failed to add much in the attack. In fact, he was quite sloppy in possession.”
Salzburg vs Milan – ” He was subbed off by Pioli early in the second half (presumably because of the yellow card), but the captain also struggled a bit especially with keeping control of the ball. Dest looked a lot more comfortable when he came on.”
This is all quotes from these very boards, words you all read here and decided to ignore. Just like you cover your eyes everytime someone you think is a “treue Milanista” has the ball.
Truth is Calabria isn’t very fast, he is not great at 1 vs 1, maybe only decent. He isn’t positioning himself correctly and he is poor at anticipating what opponent will do. He also always has LW helping him and a CB covering his ass, because that side is full of holes. That is why so many crosses and or actions that end up being converted to goals come from his side.
Offensively he is even worse. He is Assias or Brahim level.
There is a reason why every single team that plays against us is trying to attack that side. He is that reason.
I said LW instead of RW and treue instead true. My apologies
I’ve been saying that the past three seasons. Last season he was bless Kalulu arrived and played as a CB because of Kjear injury, if not his position would be in danger by now. Then was lucky kalulu thrive as a CB and Florenzi arrived, old and prone to injuries.
I mean i am thankful he plays decent but he is not a big star like Theo for example. He is ofter off position and had cause serious damage to Milan. Actually boyh goals in the CL this season has come from that side.
Im glad I am not missreading thr games as many people made me think
Btw is either the “true milanista” or the “banter era” cards haha
LOL, you are quoting SempreMilan ratings to justify because this is the be all end all for player ratings huh?
& you people meanwhile seem to only like a player if he’s Milanista & if he leaves like Donnarumma all the sudden he stinks-you’re not even from Milan-the people from Milan are jerks anyway.
Are you simply daft? I appreciate him being a milanista but using that to justify his quality is just stupid, it’s like saying Montolivo was incredible just because he’s a milanista, come on man
It was just my opinion secondly, for me Calabria is very average with too many cracks in his craft, you shouldn’t be butthurt that I think Dest can be way better because dest is EXTREMELY talented
Dest extremely talented? Hahahahaa. He can’t defend for his life. Attacking is solid but he is such a beta boy in defense. He probably wears tampons.
yeah because most of your takes are dumb, if people followed your opinions forget Scudetto last season Milan would’ve struggled to finish bloody top 4
Calabria is young. We can only hope he will learn a thing or two from Maldini. The sad situasion here is that both Kalulu and Dest are both better as RB. It makes me sad to say but it is the truth
I simply don’t see it. Dest has played barely half of a match in total and you assess him as superior to Calabria. What is this based on?
While certainly faster (Calabria’s Achilles heel), I am not convinced Kalulu is any better at RB. Though, I certainly admit that the argument can be made here.
Shiva made som really good points you should read. Couldn`t have said it any better my self
I would have replied to his comments but the “reply” button is missing for some reason. Merely quoting views from one site is not really supporting evidence. That said, this is entirely subjective but to quote the analyst on the broadcast this weekend “Calabria is the most underrated player on the team”. He isn’t spectacular but his one-on-one defending, tactical understanding, and effort are all above average. His weakness is a lack of speed getting beat by faster wingers. I don’t think anyone will dispute that but he is actually quite good at moving forward as well but isn’t given the same freedom as Theo since the right flank needs to balance the aggressiveness of the left flank giving Theo and Leao freedom to bomb up. Again, this is all subjective so I won’t pass this off as fact as others do but I simply have not seen anything you guys are claiming aside from the lack of speed. I don’t care if he is a Milanista either, I am not swayed by that.
I also noticed that you neglected to defend your position on Dest. Perhaps you realized how ludicrous it is to claim he is better than Calabria based on his two limited appearances.
Honest Truth, you said it yourself, he is not spectacular but he is above average. His speed does not bother me. If you are a good defender you will figure out ways to be one of the best. Look at Thiago Silva in PL. Who knew at the age of 30 something and his slow pace he could show world class defending. Now that is something. Don`t get me wrong, I like Calabria but we need someone with the same class as Theo as RB. I am sure changes will happen. I believe Florenzi is also better than Calabria.
Dest is simply way more comfortable with the ball. The minutes he has played he has shown more control and better understanding on the pitch. You will see what everybody else sees very soon. I have followed Dest since he played for Barcelona.
and this makes Dest better, you kidding me?
Dest is overhyped by Americans, he is nothing special also his defending is dogcrap, we dont need two offensive fullbacks, Theo already pushes forward a lot
You said it like it’s so easy for all to improve defending trait. I don’t think Sergino’s defending trait better than Calabria.
And why don’t you also judge how Calabria help ball-possession with be the extra midfielder, covering spaces that leaved by Tonali to go up ?
Sergino was good when on the ball but not off the ball, compared to Calabria.
Yeah..nah.as long donnarumma bein called up,the cursed will continue,
Couldn’t agree more. Italian fans should be more concerned about Donnarumma’s reliability moreso than the RB position. Sure, he makes spectacular saves but also lets simple goals in. I rather dependability than flair in that position.
Actually man if the full back can stop the attack to begin with like Maldini used to you can afford to have a lousy goalie like Dida was for Milan lol plus Donnarumma has never made a mistake that decided an Italy game like Radu did for Inter-plus who do you suggest Italy use instead of Donnarumma? Consigli & Sirigu are gonna be 36. Meret & Gollini are also older than Donnarumma & they look even more clumsy. Cragno doesn’t even play at Monza-I guess you can use Monza’s starter Carnesecchi but the youngster hardly has any experience-Lazio’s Provedel looks OK but nobody is playing like Toldo used to-I’m sure Donnarumma will rediscover his form from the Euros but it’s hard when everyone is constantly hating on you like Balotelli
This!! he made spectacular save but conceaded easily with simple chance. This is actually costed us when he was our GK.
@Honest Truth let’s compare Calabria’s highlights across his career (a 25 year old) to Dest’s (21 year old). At Ajax and Barca, Dest has technique, speed, stamina, good crossing and in his last few Barca matches he even had some decent defending, defending is Dest’s weakpoint just to point out because you clearly have never watched him before besides the few minutes for Milan. Calabria don’t get me wrong, isn’t the problem with milan, but his ceiling doesn’t seem high enough and he is quite average in everything he does, in 1V1’s he struggles to keep control of his opponent, and in regards to the attack he struggles to make a proper contribution a lot of the time. His man marking is very weak as he struggles a lot with keeping ahold of his man. Disagree or Agree, IN MY OPINION, Dest can be better than Calabria
I can’t disagree with anyone’s opinion as it is entirely subjective and you are entitled to it provided you can defend the argument to some extent. That said, I haven’t seen much of Dest prior to him joining Milan. Watched him for the US team against Canada and he was not impressive from what I saw. One game is hardly indicative of a player’s ability so will defer to those who have seen more of him. I just haven’t personally seen anything that impresses me thus far. Potential aside, I would rather have Calabria on the pitch than Dest at RB right now. That could easily change in a year or two but right now, that is the way I see it.
I’m sorry but Italia’s squad is not impressive nor intimidating at all. Aside from a few talents, it’s downright weak.
Italia is a shade of it’s former self, especially the weak weak defense and man child in goal.
Most of Germany’s goals on Italy were Calabria’s fault but apparently none of u watched that game smh Di Lorenzo is no better on defense so Florenzi or Darmian should play since they are the only ones who actually try to tackle on the right even though Florenzi fell & let Bulgaria scored on us which helped cost us the World Cup smh I miss Zambrotta
Calabria are as average as De Sciglio, only that he put more effort & younger.. if he could increase his crossing accuracy, he is good for 1st team.. else he is good backup
Nah. Calabria is way better than the mediocre De sciglio.
With all due respect for Calabria as a true Milanista and captain, he is our weakest defense. He is like Ambrosini IMHO and again with all due respect to Ambrosini, when gattuso, pirlo and seedorf is fit, he rarely played. Once Pirlo left, ambrosini took his spotlight. He rarely become the first choice but his loyality and leadership in the dressing room is unquestionable.
You are so wrong. It’s crazy you probably never watched. We played a 4321…. seedorf and kaka played the 2. And gattuso pirlo and ambro played the 3… seedorf and ambro didn’t occupy the same spot besides when injuries or necessity lead to it lol. Know your facts or close that hole you call a mouth.
he is doing much better this year, but Calabria will never be a UCL suitable RB, thats it. Kalulu way better as RB….
Based on what? 1-2 good RB performances. 2-3 bad ones, and plenty of great CB performances? Yes so glad you are not in charge. Go play fifa. You know nothing of real sports. Kalulu is a CB through and through. Only a moron would put him where he “prefers” at RB.
If you lookcat the past you will see that no club ever sent an offer for Calabria. That is the evidence of his bad performances. We can love him because of he is milanista, but his performaces are not so good.
Love the Calabria bashing and crucified his contributions just because he doesn’t give spectacular performance for 90 minutes.
Even more funnier where Milan conceded and never his fault, these people also blame Calabria and not other players who didn’t do their job. Example like:
– Salzburg goal because Bennacer made mistake with his touch and Kalulu fallen down easily like an amateur because Okafor nutmeg him.
– Sampdoria goal because Tonali can’t mark Djuricic.
– Zagreb goal because Tomori left his post.
– Inter two goals. The first because one of Kalulu / Tomori shouldn’t left their post. The second goal Tomori can’t mark Dzeko.
Our CB duo, Tomori and Kalulu are not as solid as last season either. They made plenty of unusual mistakes while still bad in aerial duel that cost Milan. But how funny they rarely got criticized.
Calabria himself definitely not flawless. He sometimes have a decent performance like he did against Udinese, Bologna, Sampdoria, or Zagreb. But to say he’s a liability is just completely false.
Il capitano!! It is ok, time to rest
Y’all can argue though..
Then why did Emerson always called even he was hardly play for Chelsea ?
I think Calabria deserved to be called. Calabria also better than Florenzi at ACM. So why didn’t Calabria called ? Mancini has something personal ?