Gazzetta dello Sport made Inter’s Pio Esposito the face of Italy’s new era two days before the Nations League opener, and made Moise Kean of Como the face of the 2-0 defeat to Belgium the morning after. Both strikers started at the Stadio Olimpico on 25 September 2026. The match ratings put Kean level with Esposito or ahead of him. The covers told a different story. I read that as quiet, tendentious framing from a Milan paper that has long found room for Inter.
I read Gazzetta every morning, alongside the other Italian sports papers, as part of my prep for every match I call. It has real quality, including strong columns from former players and coaches. For me, its lack of objectivity has been loud for years, and that is exactly what costs it the title of Italy’s best sports paper. It is also why its front-page choices deserve a closer look.
One thing first, so it is clear from the start. I rate Pio Esposito highly, as a player and as a professional. He is a gifted striker, he is the future of Italy up front, and he may already be its present. My issue is the spotlight. Gazzetta, the pink paper, shines a brighter light on him than on anyone else in the squad, and the reason looks like the club he plays for. When Italy are getting hyped, he is the hero on the front page. When Italy lose, the light moves to someone else.
What did the covers say?
On Wednesday 23 September the whole front page belonged to Esposito. A photo of the 21-year-old flexing in an Italy shirt, the headline “Pio d’Italia”, and above it “Il 9 di Mancini, Esposito è pronto”, Mancini’s number nine is ready. The subheading described the Inter striker muscling his way into the centre of the attack. It was a coronation before a single minute under Roberto Mancini.
On match day, Friday 25 September, the cover went to Mancini himself, wrapped in the Tricolore under “Fatevi amare”, make yourselves loved. The text flagged “Pio-Kean in attacco”. The strike partnership was a pair on the page.
On Saturday 26 September, after Belgium won 2-0 and the Olimpico whistled at the end, the headline read “Italia 2 schiaffi”, two slaps. The main photo was Kean, hands on his head, mouth open. Esposito does not appear in the cover photos.
Did Kean play worse than Esposito?
The ratings put him level or ahead. Sky Sport Italia’s Stefano De Grandis gave both of them 5.5. He noted that Kean spent the night on the right wing, away from his best position, and that Esposito hit the post from an offside position and was taken off when Italy needed a goal. CalcioMercato.it gave Kean a 6 and Esposito a 5, and wrote that Italy were only dangerous through Kean. Esposito went off after 66 minutes for Daniel Maldini. Kean played the full match.
So the hope had a name and a club, and the defeat had a different name and a different club.
Isn’t a cover just the best photo?
That is the fair counter-argument, and I take it seriously. A front page needs the strongest image, and a striker with his hands on his head tells a defeat in one frame. Kean gave the photographers that picture. Picture desks work fast and late at night.
My answer is the pattern. The paper had already built the week around Esposito, and on the morning after the defeat it still found space for Inter news on the front page. Every fact on those covers is accurate. The framing works through emphasis: who gets the hero shot, who gets the reaction shot, and when. Over a season, that shapes how a young player is judged.
I have been flagging Gazzetta’s blind spots for years. On 4 July 2019 the paper ran an “exclusive” interview with Urbano Cairo, the owner of Torino and also the chairman of RCS MediaGroup, Gazzetta’s own publisher. I wrote on X at the time that it was the chairman speaking through his property. The Esposito and Kean covers are a softer version of the same habit. A paper’s choices carry interests, and readers deserve to see them.
I was not the only one reading it that way. On the morning of 26 September 2026, as the paper hit the newsstands, Italian fans on X picked up on the same framing.
Why does this matter to fans reading in English?
Most English-language coverage of Italy leans on the Italian press, and headlines travel faster than ratings. If “Pio d’Italia” becomes the story, Esposito carries a weight he has not earned yet, and Kean carries a defeat he shared. I think he and Gianluca Scamacca are Italy’s long-term answer up front, with Kean in form part of the equation. That is a football judgement. The covers made a different one, and it is worth reading the paper with that in mind.
For more on where Mancini’s players come from, see the club-by-club breakdown of his first squad, and for Esposito’s rise, our list of Serie A’s best young players.
