Italy manager Robert Mancini was hugely disappointed after his team was knocked out from the World Cup qualifying race after they suffered a shocking loss of 1-0 against North Macedonia on Thursday. Mancini admitted that he has lived his biggest disappointment.

In fact, Italy could not even qualify for the FIFA World Cup in the previous edition, which was hosted by Russia in 2018. The European Champions were knocked out after Aleksandar Trajkovski scored for North Macedonia in the stoppage time (90+2 minute).

The Azzurri dominated the contest with 66% possession but could only take five shots on target out of the total 32 they attempted.

Italy had clinched Euro 2020 after beating England but once again could only qualify for the quadrennial showpiece.

In his post-match comments, the 57-year-old said: “Last July, I had the biggest joy in my career at the Euro. Now, I just lived the biggest disappointment. This is football, sometimes incredible things happen. It’s difficult for me to analyze this game, I didn’t even look at the stats. We totally deserved to win the European Championship, but the luck that favored us eventually turned its back on us.”

In fact, Italy had their chances throughout the game but the players couldn’t grab them. Mancini was disappointed as he feels there are many good players but he felt sorry for them.

“I don’t know what to say. Perhaps we should not have come to this point. We had at least two chances that usually don’t end up like this. We just needed to score one. Conceding such a goal on 90 minutes adds insult to injury. This is a team with many good players, I am really sorry for them.”

There is no doubt that Robert Mancini’s place as Italy’s manager will now be under scrutiny after they have failed to qualify for the World Cup.