JAKARTA - Italy for the third time failed to qualify for the World Cup. Bosnia-Herzegovina became Italy's nightmare after winning 4-1 (1-1) in a penalty shootout drama in the 2026 World Cup playoff final at the Bilino Polje Stadium, Wednesday, April 1, 2026 early morning WIB.
Italy again failed to show their ability on the biggest football stage on earth. Ironically, for the third time, Italy extinguished the dream of flying to the United States, Canada and Mexico, which will host the 2026 World Cup.
Italy, which is a four-time world champion, is no longer a top team so it always slips in the qualifying or playoff rounds. In the qualifiers, Gli Azzurri lost to Norway so they only took second place in the group. As a result, Italy had to play the playoffs and narrowly won 2-0 over Northern Ireland in the semi-finals.
When they qualified for the final, they had to face Bosnia who eliminated Wales through a penalty shootout. Bosnia's success in advancing to the final made the Italian players happy. Even their celebration went viral. The players celebrated Bosnia's victory because they believed they could beat Edin Dzeko et al in the final. Italy was impressed with underestimating their opponents.
The actions of the players under Gennaro Gattuso immediately invited criticism. Not less than the former Bosnia national team player who once defended Juventus, Miralem Pjanic, criticized the celebration from the Italian camp. However, Italian midfielder Federico Dimarco was quick to dismiss their celebration and stated that they did not underestimate Bosnia.
Only, Dimarco seems to have closed his eyes when Bosnia has a row of players who have memorized their game characters. How not, in the back line there is Sead Kolasinac who plays at Atalanta and Tarik Muharemovic, the tandem of Jay Idzes at Sassuolo. Meanwhile, Dzeko has been wandering in the Italian Serie A with Inter Milan, AS Roma to Fiorentina before landing at Schalke.
Proven, Muharemovic and Kolasinac were able to dampen the Italian front line. Although they conceded first, they played solidly so that Italy, who then played with 10 players since the end of the first half, failed to add a goal. They also managed to score a goal and then win a penalty shootout which made Gattuso apologize to Italian fans.
"It's really painful to be eliminated like this. We are disappointed and sorry for failing to realize [qualify for the final round]," Gattuso said as quoted by Football Italia.
"The players don't deserve this result when they see how hard they work, their love for the national team and their determination. We actually had three chances and almost all of their crosses never endangered us," he said.
"Whatever, I'm still proud of my players. This teaches football to continue to improve," said Gattuso again.
Meanwhile, Bosnia coach Sergej Barbarez admitted that he was proud to be able to lead his team to the World Cup for the second time. They first appeared at the 2014 World Cup, although they were only able to survive until the group stage. He did not hesitate to praise his players' fighting spirit to match Italy.
"They do have a strong character. They have made us proud," said Barbarez, who hopes Bosnia can also qualify for the 2028 European Cup.
"I always tell the players that we have to perform in the tournament every two years," he said.
In that match, Bosnia showed a spirit of not giving up even though they lost individual quality and experience. On the other hand, Italy was a little nervous when starting the match. However, they were able to overcome the mental pressure and the attack that was set up successfully broke Bosnia's goal when the match entered the 15th minute.
It started with pressure from striker Mateo Retegui on goalkeeper Nikola Vasilj and he then gave the ball to Nicolo Barella. The Inter midfielder passed the ball to Moise Kean who confidently shot into the goal. This is Kean's eighth goal in six appearances with Italy.
The goal also gave Italy a 1-0 lead. Bosnia immediately responded with an offensive game. They also got a good chance through Ermedin Demirovic in the 38th minute. Only, this header was still wide.
Italy, who were safe with the advantage, actually still played offensively. However, a mistake made by Bastoni made Italy's game immediately change. Because of that, Bastoni made a hard foul against Amar Memic in the 41st minute. No doubt, referee Clement Turpin issued a red card for this Inter player.
Gattuso also took action by pulling Retegui and inserting Federico Gatti to strengthen the defense sector. The effort gave little result. Even though playing with 10 players, Italy was still able to maintain a 1-0 lead until the first half ended.
Entering the second half, Italy began to be wary because Bosnia was playing pressing. In the 52nd minute, goalkeeper Gianluigi Donnarumma had to fight to hit the ball to thwart Kerim Alajbegovic's hard shot.
Italy actually had a good chance through Kean when taking advantage of Memic's bad pass. But his shot after successfully snatching the ball from Memic instead soared narrowly over the crossbar. Likewise, the efforts of Francesco Pio Esposito and Dimarco still did not bear fruit.
When Italy failed to add a goal, on the other hand, Bosnia was able to overcome the deadlock to equalize the score. The goal was created after Dzeko's assist was maximized by Haris Tabakovic to equalize the score to 1-1 in the 79th minute.
There were no additional goals so the score remained until the end of the match. When the match continued extra time, neither Bosnia nor Italy managed to score. The match had to be completed through a penalty shootout.
Bosnia showed readiness in the toss-toss. Proven, all the penalty kickers, Benjamin Tahirovic, Haris Tabakovic, Kerim Alajbegovic and Esmir Bajrakterovic managed to complete the execution. They were able to conquer Donnarumma. The fifth Bosnia kicker did not carry out the task because they were ahead 4-2.
The reason is that only Sandro Tonali from Italy succeeded in carrying out the execution. Meanwhile, Esposito and Bryan Cristante failed to complete it which made Italy eliminated.
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