The global failure reignites the conflict around the FIGC. Here are the possible scenarios (and the not very credible ones) between the role of Gravina, the CONI and politics.
And what happens now? The global failure of Gattuso’s national team opens a period of strong turbulence within Italian football with a single man in command in everyone’s sights: Gabriele Gravina. The FIGC president dashed the hopes of those who wanted him to resign already on the dramatic night in Zenica postponing the decision and the formal, but also substantive steps, to the return to Italy and to the institutional headquarters represented by the Federal Council. There will be no surrender to popular sentiment, ridden in a more or less clumsy manner by politics and its opponents: the settling of accounts will take place within the football system and then we’ll see.
It doesn’t mean that Gravina considers himself untouchableit could not be in the face of a sporting failure of such dimensions which represents a shock for the entire movement, but not even that he is willing to accept the role of sole responsibility for a structural crisis that has deep rootsnot only of a technical nature, and which affects all the components that are part of the system. Even those who compete the day after the defeat to dictate recipes that are not very functional but certainly have a strong popular impact.
The disappointment in Bosnia and the political assault on football
Already in the heat of Bosnia some of Gravina’s references were clear. The call for politics, for example, the first to trigger the wave of requests for resignation but also the last when it came to concretely helping Italian football in recent years. It is clear that the failure to qualify for the World Cup for the third consecutive time, the second under his leadership, is a step that must open up reflections even outside the FIGC but the immediate positions taken by many political parties or figures are one thing, a possible declaration of intent by those sitting in Palazzo Chigi is another and up to now President Meloni has always kept away from football matters.
The discontent became official with the note from the Minister of Sport Andrea Abodi: “It is clear to everyone that Italian football must be re-founded and that this process must start again from a renewal of the FIGC’s top management. The Government has concretely demonstrated, in recent years, its commitment to the entire Italian sports movement. I consider it objectively incorrect to attempt to deny its responsibilities for the third consecutive failure to qualify for the World Cup, accusing the institutions of an alleged non-compliance and belittling the importance and professional level of other sports”. And again: “We will continue, as we have done so far, to do what the institutions are responsible for but we need responsibility, humility and respect from everyone. Italy must go back to being Italy, even in world football.”
In the Federal Council Gravina enjoyed before the week of the truth of one Bulgarian majoritylegacy of the 98.7% of the votes obtained on the day of re-election in February 2025. That is the world that will have to tell the president whether to move forward or take a step back, not those from outside aiming to carve out a space of power and visibility at a low price. Also because on the day after the defeat, scenarios are drawn that are difficult to apply concretely, such as that of the commissioner being placed at the hands of Coni.
The (difficult) hypothesis of a Coni commissioner
It is possible that the president Luciano Buonfiglio decide to intervene to relieve Gravina of his duties? No. It is not foreseen for a missed sporting result, however painful and with obvious repercussions. When the FIGC was placed under commissionership (the last time after the resignation of Carlo Tavecchio in 2017) it always happened due to the impossibility of electing a new president due to the lack of a majority and not for other reasons. And today the sides are quite defined and those who are in the minority remain so.
It is certain that whoever wants to overthrow Gravina will rely on the name of Giovanni Malagòwho has just been dismissed from politics due to the desire not to grant him an exemption as number one of the Coni and fresh from the extraordinary triumph of the Milan Cortina Olympics. The first to speak publicly about his figure was the president of Napoli, Aurelio De Laurentiisone of the historical opponents of Gravina and the current system. In the event of elections, however, it should be remembered that the Lega Serie A only accounts for 20% while the non-professional football component represented at this stage by Giancarlo Abete remains very strong, almost independent. (National Amateur League). The man who resigned in 2014 together with the coach Prandelli after the elimination from the groups at the hands of Uruguay and also one of Gravina’s great voters and supporters.
In short, the current tenant of the Via Allegri headquarters in Rome could still enjoy broad support moving forward. The will to resist even in the face of a siege that has already taken the form of a personal attack and often an insult will then need to be verified: what will you decide to do in this case? Gravina is a fighter but the air around him and the FIGC has been heavy and it won’t improve from here on out. On the contrary. Be careful, though, because while it fights the internal battle, Italian football must not forget about the one it is carrying out so as not to get off the train of the 2032 European Championship for which Gravina himself has spent a lot of his weight at UEFA level but which is not yet armored given the dramatic situation in which the Italian plant engineering finds itself (the coincidence with the investigation into San Siro made 31 March 2026 a black day for the entire system).
Who is responsible for the lack of reforms?
Last topic, which in reality should be the first, the recipe for bringing our football or what remains of it out of the shallows of a now systemic crisis. We must be wary of those who today say that everything could be done in a few steps, reducing the number of teams in Serie A, streamlining the calendars, canceling the various cups and cups created in recent years or imposing the use of Italian players instead of foreigners. Some of these things (the limits on foreigners for example) cannot be done and others – the remodeling of the championships – are reforms opposed not by the FIGC but by the various leagues which do not accept a reduction in numbers. It’s called friendly fire and it has been paralyzing Italian football for some time; it hit Gravina and will inexorably hit the next president too, be it him or anyone else.
Once the wave of legitimate indignation over the sporting collapse has dissipated, much if not everything will go back to how it was before regardless of who the president of the FIGC is. And very often those who are candidates to lead the new course have been protagonists of the failures of the previous ones, as in a continuous “Groundhog Day” in which we always start from the box of year zero. The timing is these: hours and days of infernal debate and, in the case of Gravina’s step backwards, three months to go to elections with a credible candidate who holds together a majority. We arrive at the heart of summer. They will be very tough weeks, of settling accounts and many poisons.
