Italy international Mario Balotelli has said he "lost an important opportunity" after Italy suffered a surprise World Cup elimination in his absence.
The European champions were stunned by North Macedonia in Palermo in their World Cup play-off, losing 1-0 to miss out on a chance to play at the World Cup in Qatar. It is the second time in a row the Azzurri have fallen short, after Sweden shut them out in a 2018 play-off.
Balotelli's winner against England in the 2014 group stage remains Italy's last goal during the World Cup finals, while the 2006 champions haven't played a knockout game in the competition since that year's final. And, while Balotelli stopped short of saying he would have guaranteed his country qualification had he been involved, the former Manchester City striker has spoken out about the failure.
Balotelli, who plays his club football for Adana Demirspor in Turkey, hasn't made a senior Italy appearance since 2018. However, he was called up by Mancini for a training camp earlier this year off the back of his form in the Super Lig.
The manager, who worked with him at Manchester City and Inter Milan, insisted the move was not borne out of desperation. "If that desperation is the same as that before the European Championship, then that's fine," he said.
"But that's not the situation here. Over the next few days we'll try different things and evaluate players that have not been called up for a while, like Mario, and others that are new."
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"I'm always missed when we lose," Balotelli told Sky Sport Italia (via The Mail ). 'It's easy to say it now but before the match no one thought about me.
"I watched the match and there were were opportunities. In front of goal I'm pretty good and I'm not saying we would have won if I had been playing but there were opportunities to score.
"It hurts, but the matter is not the call-up against North Macedonia or Turkey. The World Cup is in December and I could have been part of the team. I think I had a chance and I've lost an important opportunity. To see Italy out of the World Cup is too bad."
After the defeat to North Macedonia, Mancini's own mother questioned the decision to leave out Balotelli. Italy had 32 attempts on goal against the underdogs but failed to score with any of them, and Aleksandar Trajkovski scored the only goal of the game in second-half stoppage time.
“Yesterday could’ve gone better, but this is football, sometimes things go right and sometimes things go wrong," Mancini's mother Marianna Puolo told Radiunno. We had the match in our hands but the attack wasn’t great. I would have called up Balotelli, because he has incredible physical strength and in front of the goal nobody can stop him.”
In his Sky Sport interview, Balotelli revealed he had not spoken to Mancini about the matter. "I am happy that he will remain in charge because he has already won the Euros," he added. "People are disappointed, but we can't forget what the coach has achieved."
