Of course, Roberto Mancini never gets bored in Saudi Arabia. This time the new troubles for the Italian coach at the helm of the Saudi national team come on the eve of the debut in the African Cup of Nations against Oman: three of his players were excluded because "they wanted to play starters".
"It's a very strange situation and it's the first time I've had an experience like this...", the former Azzurri coach had to admit in the press conference on the eve of the match. And it must not have been a problem of misunderstanding because of the language. In recent days, he admitted that he had only learned a few words in Arabic. "Al-Faraj, Al-Ghannam and Al-Aqidi wanted to be the starting players - Mancini explained, justifying to journalists the reason for these exclusions that are also heavy for his national team - They are the ones who decided not to play, not me".
The first footballer "did not want to play friendlies", Al-Ghanem "was not happy to play for the national team"; while Al-Aqidi "told the goalkeeping coach that if he didn't play as a starter then he preferred to leave". "I'm the coach and the one who makes the decisions," Mancini thundered.
"We asked him two or three times if they wanted to play for the national team and the answer was no," he continued, "I understand the desire of experienced players to play as starters, but not that a young player doesn't want to join his national team if he is not guaranteed a place on the pitch from the start." The Saudi adventure of "one thousand and one nights" is proving to be more challenging than expected for the coach from the Marche region. "I'm fine, even if the work is quite hard," he admitted in recent days. The only judge, however, is always the field. Tomorrow his Saudi Arabia against Oman will have to play well and win to give a response to the huge investments of the federation and the Saudi government itself through its sovereign wealth fund.
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