Turkey vs Italy

The two sides that suffered 2022 World Cup play-offs heartaches are set to trade tackles at the Konya Buyuksehir Belediye Stadium as Turkey take on Italy.

Turkey’s bid to reach their first World Cup finals since 2002 collapsed last time out as they succumbed to a 3-1 defeat to Portugal in their play-off semi-finals. The ‘Crescent-Stars’ will be desperate to bounce back and launch a new winning streak after seeing their run of three consecutive victories come to a halt at the Estadio do Dragao. However, Turkey’s home form is hardly inspiring, as they had drawn back-to-home home internationals before thrashing continental minnows Gibraltar 6-0 last time out. Going back to 1962, Turkey have won none of their eight international meetings with Italy (D3, L5), netting an embarrassing average of 0.37 goals per game. That run includes a crushing 3-0 defeat at last season’s Euro 2020.

On the other hand, Italy found themselves on the wrong end of a 1-0 scoreline in their ‘winner takes all’ 2022 World Cup qualifying play-offs showdown against North Macedonia last time out. After going unbeaten in a world-record 37 international matches and conquering the Euro 2020, the Italians have failed to qualify for back-to-back World Cup finals for the first time in the nation’s history. Devastated by one of the biggest upsets in their footballing history, ‘Gli Azzurri’ could soon wave goodbye to long-serving manager Roberto Mancini, who refused to rule out the possibility of leaving the helm in the post-North Macedonia interview. Since beating England in the Euro 2020 grand final, Italy have drawn back-to-back away fixtures, both of which featured an uneventful ‘nil-nil’ scoreline.