I first wrote about the San Marino International Team back in October 2020 when many fans were saying "Whats the point in San Marino playing football?" and some questioning what they are allowed to continue to play at International Level due to their playing record of no competitive wins.
My argument at the time still stands now in that they are a country and have the right to play International Football and surely having smaller teams looking for that one moment of glory is what our wonderful game is all about.
We all love an outsider such as Leicester City winning the Premier League or Mon Mome winning the 2009 Grand National at odds of 100/1.
Whilst the world looked on at the Qatar World Cup Draw yesterday I thought I'd give San Marino some more words.
As they were in 2020 San Marino are currently ranked bottom of the FIFA Rankings just below The British Virgin Islands and Anguilla.
Talk about San Marino International football and the game against England in 1993 will always get a mention with the famous goal scored by David Gualtieri after just 8.3 seconds which at the time was the fastest goal in World Cup Qualifying history. San Marino International Football is much more than that famous moment!
Present figures show San Marino's estimated population at around 34,000 which is on a par population wise with Letchworth in Hertfordshire or Billingham in County Durham.
So where is San Marino? It is a microstate completely enclosed by Italy around 10 km away from the Adriatic coast in Rimini in the East of Italy. It's officially known as the 'Republic of San Marino' and is the world's smallest republic - It is not a member of the European Union but does use the Euro as it's currency. It's one of only three countries in the world to be completely enclosed by another and is the third smallest country in Europe and the fifth smallest in the world.
(The other countries enclosed are Vatican City (Italy) and Lesotho (South Africa))
(The countries smaller in Europe are Vatican City and Monaco)
(The world countries are Vatician City, Monaco, Nauru and Tuvalu)
The San Marino Football Federation was formed in 1931 but a full national team was not established until 1986 when a team played Canada's Olympic team in an unofficial game which they lost 0-1. They gained official FIFA and UEFA affiliation in 1988 and played their first sanctioned full International on Wednesday 14th November 1990 against Switzerland in a EURO 1992 qualifier - the result was a 0-4 defeat in front of a crowd of 931 at the Stadio Olimpico Di Serravalle.
Giorgio Leoni was the manager for this game and sent out a starting XI consisting of goalkeeper Pierlugi Benedettini who went to gain 25 caps for his country. His son Simone Benedettini has since been capped 8 times as goalkeeper and his nephew Elia Benedettini has 33 caps also as a goalkeeper.
Along with Lucca Gobbi (41 caps), Willam Guerra (38), Bruno Muccioli (10), Marco Montironi (5 caps), Massimo Bonini (19), Loris Zanotti (12), Massimo Ceccoli (5), Fabio Francini (34), Marco Macina (2) and Waldes Pasolini (14).
William Guerra was a painter and decorator by trade and stated prior to games against Wales in qualifiers for the 1998 World Cup that if San Marino takes a point off of Wales they he would paint all his friends houses for free. Wales won 6-0 in Cardiff and 5-0 in San Marino.
Massimo Bonini and Marco Macina remain the only two San Marino full Internationals ever to have played in Italy's top division. Bonini made 192 appearances for Juventus between 1981 to 1988 and 112 for Bologna between 1988 and 1992. Macini played for Bologna, Parma and AC Milan amongst other clubs.
It took until March 1993 (and 14 games) for San Marino to get a positive result when they drew 0-0 at home to Turkey in a World Cup 1994 qualifier game with a crowd of 957 watching.
It was then nearly a decade before they got another worthwhile result when in 2001 they drew 1-1 away in Latvia (crowd - 4000) in 2002 World Cup qualifier. Nicola Albani famously got his only goal for San Marino in this game.
There was then a wait until 2014 when in a Euro 2016 qualifier at home to Estonia they achieved a 0-0 draw in front of 759.
We then have to fast forward to their last match played in the UEFA Nations League at home to another European minnow country in Liechtenstein which also has a population of under 40,000. There was a small crowd of 178 at the Rheinpark Stadium to see another goal less draw. The statistics and highlights show San Marino played extremely well in this game and really should of recorded a monumental victory - they had 16 shots (4 on target) compared to Liechtenstein's 6 shots and 2 on target.
The match did make history as it was the first time San Marino had kept a clean sheet away from home!
San Marino don't play many friendly games but in 2003 and 2004 they did play Liechtenstein twice. In August 2003 they came back from being 2-0 down in the first 23 minutes to draw 2-2 at the Rheinpark Stadium and then on Wedneday 28th April 2004 it was their most famous game ever in their history so far!
A 1-0 victory in front of 200 at the Stadio Olimpico with their goal coming from Andy Selva who is arguably made himself the most famous Sammarinese player ever alongside David Gualtieri. His early sixth minute strike was the only goal of the game.
Their record defeat came at home to Germany in 2006 in a Euro qualifier which ended 0-13 in front of 5,019 at the Stadio Olimpico. Lukas Podolski scored four goals in this game.
Since there first official International in 1990 they have had seven managers with Italian Giampaolo Mazza being the longest serving between January 1998 to October 2013.
They have recently appointed Fabrizio Constantini in November 2021 who has moved up after a four year spell in charge of the under 21 side. He replaced Franco Varrella who had been in charge since 2018.
Since the beginning of 2010 San Marino have scored seven goals (five in competitive games). Manuel Marani and Danilo Rinaldi scored in the 2012 2-3 friendly defeat to Malta which is only the second time they have scored twice in a game with the previous occasion being the 2003 friendly v Liechtenstein which ended 2-2.
They have never scored over one goal in a competitive game.
The rest of the decade's scorers were Alesandro Della Valle (v Poland WCQ 2013), Matteo Vitaioli (2015 Euro Qualifier v Lithuania), Mattia Steffanelli (v Norway WCQ 2016), Mirko Palazzi (v Azerbaijain WCQ 2017) and Fillip Berardi (v Kazakhstan in a Euro Qualifier November 2019).
Since 2020 we've seen David Tomassini score v Kosovo in a Friendly game in June 2021, Nicola Nanni score at home to Poland in a World Cup Qualifier in September 2021 and Fillippo Fabbri score in the recent friendly game against Lithuania in in March 2022.
Manuel Marani had scored one of San Marino's most famous goals in February 2007 against a Republic of Ireland team featuring John O'Shea, Ian Harte, Richard Dunne, Damien Duff, Kevin Kilbane and Robbie Keane. His 86th minute goal made it 1-1 in a UEFA Euro Qualifier. He capitalised on a mix up in between Wayne Henderson and his defenders Dunne and Paul McShane to prod the ball goal-wards with it trickling over the line prompting scenes of huge celebration. It looked to be a memorable night for San Marino but in the 94th minute Stephen Ireland scored a winner to break the hearts of the heroic San Marino side. 2,500 of the crowd of 3,294 were Ireland supporters that night.
SAN MARINO'S CURRENT PLAYING RECORD SINCE 1990
| COMP | P | W | D | L | GF-GA | GD | PTS |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| WCQ | 66 | 0 | 2 | 64 | 11-310 | -299 | 2 |
| EURO Q | 76 | 0 | 1 | 75 | 8-340 | -332 | 1 |
| UEFA NATIONS | 10 | 0 | 2 | 8 | 0-19 | -19 | 2 |
| COMPETITIVE | 152 | 0 | 5 | 147 | 19-669 | -650 | 5 |
| FRIENDLY | 21 | 1 | 1 | 19 | 7-60 | -53 | - |
| OVERALL | 173 | 1 | 6 | 166 | 26-729 | -703 | - |
And in answer to the question which many fans who are ask "What's the point in San Marino playing football?" - Ask Andy Selva, Manuel Marani, Giampaolo Mazzi or any of the recent squad who played against Lithuania and Cape Verde - there is every right for San Marino to be playing International football and long may they continue to do so. Could they even be celebrating a win in forthcoming matches against Estonia and Malta?
San Marino's u21 side were celebrating their first positive result since 2016 last week with a 0-0 draw away in Latvia. Their last result other than a defeats was in June 2015 with was a 0-0 draw away in Estonia. Their last win was the a famous 1-0 victory over a Wales u21 back in 2013.
SAN MARINO POSITIVE RESULTS
| DATE | MATCH | COMP | RESULT |
|---|---|---|---|
| 10/3/1993 | TURKEY (HOME) | WCQ | 0-0 |
| 25/4/2001 | LATVIA (AWAY) | WCQ | 1-1 |
| 20/8/2003 | LIECHTENSTEIN (AWAY) | FRIENDLY | 2-2 |
| 28/4/2004 | LEICHTENSTEIN (HOME) | FRIENDLY | 1-0 |
| 15/11/2014 | ESTONIA (HOME) | EURO Q | 0-0 |
| 13/10/2020 | LEICHTENSTEIN (AWAY) | NATIONS | 0-0 |
| 14/11/2021 | GIBRALTAR (HOME) | NATIONS | 0-0 |
SAN MARINO FORTHCOMING FIXTURES
All UEFA Nations League
2nd June - Estonia (Current FIFA Ranking 110)
5th June - MALTA (Current FIFA Ranking 169)
12th June - Malta
26th September - ESTONIA
Estonia are without a win in five games with their last victory in October 2021 when they beat Belarus 2-0. Since then that have found goals hard to come by with 0-1, 1-3, 0-2, 0-0 and 0-2 results. The defeat in their last game was against Cyrpus who are currently FIFA ranked 105.
Malta ended a run of six games without a win with two wins in a row recently. They beat Azerbaijan (ranked 129) 1-0 and Kuwait (146) 2-0.
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