Italian football boss Carlo Tavecchio said recently that failure to qualify for the World Cup would be the apocalypse and his worst fears came true on Monday as they missed out on the finals for the first time in 60 years. Italy's 1-0 aggregate defeat in their European playoff, after Jakob Johansson's deflected strike in Stockholm, is likely to go down alongside elimination by North Korea at the 1966 World Cup as one of their greatest football debacles. The Italians have only failed to qualify for the tournament once before - missing out on the 1958 finals in Sweden - after not entering the first World Cup in 1930. It was also the tear-jerking end to the career of their 39-year-old goalkeeper and captain Gianluigi Buffon who made his Italy debut 20 years ago against Russia - on the last occasion that Italy had to face a playoff for a World Cup place. LAST GAME"It's upsetting that my last Italy game coincides with our elimination for the World Cup," said Buffon, a World Cup winner in 2006.

Source: The Star November 14, 2017 07:52 UTC