Alessandro Romano, the Cagliari player, revealed the reasons for his choice to represent the first Italian national team, after he played for all the Swiss national teams from U-16 to U-20.
Romano, 20, was born and raised in Switzerland to Italian parents, before returning to Italy at the age of 16 and joining Roma's academy from Swiss club Winterthur.
Romano started the season remarkably with Cagliari and scored a goal in his first appearance in the Italian League, attracting the attention of Roberto Mancini, the coach of the Italian national team, who decided to include him in the team’s roster for the first time in preparation for the European Nations League.
Romano told the Swiss newspaper Belk on Tuesday: “I worked every day to reach this moment. Before the start of the preparation period with Cagliari, I worked hard during the summer and prepared in the best possible way, and what is happening now confirms that the work I put in was not in vain.
He added: “I wanted to give everything I had in training and play as many matches as possible.” Before the preparation period, I watched as many Cagliari matches as possible to understand the way coach Fabio Pisacani played, because good preparation is very important to me.
Regarding his choice to represent the Italian national team, he said: “This is what I felt in my heart.” I did not make a list of pros and cons, and I did not think about the team with which I would have more opportunities or the team that recently qualified for a major tournament.
Romano explained that Claudio Ranieri, the current sporting director of the Italian Football Federation and former coach of Roma, contacted him to persuade him to represent the Italian national team.
Romano concluded his speech by saying: “In the end, I made my decision out of the heart, and I chose Italy because I feel that it is the team I want to represent, and not because I refused to represent another team.”
Noel Mooney, CEO of the Welsh Football Association, downplayed the importance of talking about major reforms within the International Federation of Association Football (FIFA), stressing that the letter sent by Federation President Gianni Infantino to the national federations does not talk about a comprehensive reform of the federation.
Infantino proposed an external review of FIFA's workings, explaining in a letter to members of the International Federation Council and all national federations that independent procedures would provide "recommendations on potential improvements."
“I saw the headlines today talking about major reforms in FIFA, but that is not what I understood from the message, frankly,” Mooney said.
The British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) quoted Mooney as saying on Tuesday: “I saw the same message that was sent, and it does not actually talk about reforming FIFA itself. “It is talking about reform related to strategic projects and initiatives, and they will look at how to consult on them and how to make decisions related to them.”
Infantino is under increasing pressure because of the proposal, which included selling stakes in the World Cup and other tournaments to private investors.
The Welsh Federation was one of the first national federations to withdraw its support for Infantino’s candidacy for a new term, and Mooney reiterated that the Federation would not support his candidacy in the elections scheduled for March 2027.
“When choosing a FIFA president, the goal should be to choose someone who preserves and protects the values of the game, and not someone who seeks to sell parts of it,” Mooney said.
He added: “The World Cup does not need direct investment companies. They have billions and billions of dollars in reserves. Give us money and let us build stadiums. "You have huge reserves, so let's get them as quickly as possible."
Mooney pointed out that World Cup revenues in Qatar amounted to about eight billion dollars, while revenues for the 2026 edition in Canada, the United States and Mexico are expected to reach $16 billion, adding: “It is a 100 percent increase in revenues, so they gave us a 100 percent increase.”
China strengthened its dominance in swimming and continued to move away from the top of the medal table in the Asian Games, against the host Japan, on the third day of the Aichi-Nagoya Games.
China has strengthened its dominance in the swimming competitions held in Tokyo, winning 15 gold medals out of 20 so far in the pool.
China leads the medal table with 31 gold, while Japan comes in second place by a large margin with 11 gold, and South Korea and Kazakhstan shared third place with six gold each at the end of Tuesday's competitions.
But China did not impose complete control during the evening, as Japanese Yumiki Kojima (17 years old) won the 400m medley race with an Asian Games record time of 4:07.02 minutes, achieving a Japanese double.
The teenager, who was followed by Olympic champion Leon Marchand, now puts the French star in his goal range before the 2028 Los Angeles Olympics.
“Right now, Marchand is my biggest goal,” Kojima said, adding: “I want to keep getting closer to him, even if it is step by step, and eventually surpass him.”
India won its first gold medal in this twentieth edition of the largest sporting event in Asia, and Smriti Mandhana was the hero of the achievement when she led the women's team to the cricket title at the expense of Sri Lanka by 147 points.
"It's good to win India's first gold medal," Mandhana told AFP.
“It feels great,” she added. “We saw other athletes winning gold on television.”
The men's cricket competitions begin on Thursday, and India is a candidate to win the title as well.
While mixed martial arts (MMA) makes its first appearance in the tournament, it is making a bold attempt to one day become part of the Olympic program.
Teo Hui Hoon was one of the first champions to be crowned in the history of the Games, after the Singaporean won gold in the traditional women's category under 60 kg.
She said: “I felt very emotional when I realized that I had won the fight. "I've never cried after a fight before."
In the Arab world, Jordanian karate player Muhammad al-Jaafari gifted the Arabs their second gold medal, with a clear victory in the under-84 kg final over Iranian Ali Asghar Asiabri 9-1.
It is the third medal for Jordan in the current games, all in karate competitions, after Jude Al-Dawros' silver and Abdul-Rahman Al-Mustafa's bronze.
