Lisbon<\/p>\n
Forward Mario Balotelli has been dropped by Italy coach Roberto Mancini for Monday\u2019s Nations League game against European champions Portugal in Lisbon.<\/p>\n
Nice striker Balotelli came under fire for his performance in their Nations League opener against Poland on Friday, where the Azzurri were held 1-1.<\/p>\n
The 28-year-old was substituted with a muscular problem, with Mancini conceding his fitness level was a problem.
\nIt will be the first game which Balotelli has not played since Mancini took over last May after the four-time winners\u2019 devastating failure to qualify for the World Cup.<\/p>\n
But Balotelli has made the trip to Portugal with the squad as Mancini considers him to be a central figure in the team he is trying to rebuild.<\/p>\n
Balotelli had played in all four games so far under Mancini, scoring in a 2-1 friendly win over Saudi Arabia.<\/p>\n
Mancini\u2019s other two friendlies were a 3-1 defeat to World Cup winners France and 1-1 draw with the Netherlands.<\/p>\n
Lorenzo Pellegrini has also been left out along with Cagliari goalkeeper Alessio Cragno, Juventus defender Daniele Rugani and Roma midfielder Nicolo Zaniolo.<\/p>\n
Mancini confirmed that Fiorentina forward Federico Chiesa would start after the 20-year-old proved pivotal when he came on last Friday, along with goalkeeper Gianluigi Donnarumma.<\/p>\n
Balotelli\u2019s place could be taken by either Andrea Belotti or Ciro Immobile.<\/p>\n
\u201cA player knows when he has played well or badly,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
\u201cI think Mario knows full well what his performance against Poland was like. Criticism is part of the game.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Lisbon Forward Mario Balotelli has been dropped by Italy coach Roberto Mancini for Monday\u2019s Nations League game against European champions Portugal in Lisbon. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":41870,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[122],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-41869","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/41869","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=41869"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/41869\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":41871,"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/41869\/revisions\/41871"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/41870"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=41869"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=41869"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=41869"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}