In November final 12 months on this planet’s fifth-smallest nation San Marino, a brand new exhibition opened within the nationwide museum charting the nation’s footballing heritage titled “challenging the impossible”.
Inside per week, employees had been already planning for an enlargement when the bottom of all FIFA’s 210-ranked nations accomplished that problem considerably sooner than anybody anticipated.
On November 18, San Marino secured promotion from the fourth and backside tier of the Nations League with a 3-1 win in Liechtenstein to pique the curiosity not solely of holiday makers to the Titanus Museum, however a lot of Europe.
The part-time footballers, full-time plumbers, store staff – and graphic designers, within the case of most-capped participant Matteo Vitaioli – had been making nationwide information across the continent. Transfer over Spain, that is San Marino’s second.
A rustic which had spent 20 years ready so as to add to the one victory it had ever recorded racked up two in simply over a month to win their group forward of Liechtenstein and Gibraltar, who had held Romania and Wales respectively earlier in 2024.
Not everybody wanted alerting to San Marino’s shock ascension. The micro-state had already grow to be a cult determine additional afield, with a rising variety of onlookers entertained by the fortunes of a rustic the place even scoring a purpose, of which that they had managed simply 33 of their total historical past, remained a novelty.
A lot of their rising informal following was fed by ‘San Marino Fan Account’, which has racked up virtually 200,000 followers on X since June 2019 posting tongue-in-cheek optimistic, borderline fanatical and most persistently block-capital takes throughout every of the nation’s video games, at all times adamant that San Marino’s subsequent opponents can be made to pay for his or her newest defeat.
“WE WRITE HISTORY BY SCORING THREE MATCHES IN A ROW,” was one such notably enthusiastic instance in November 2023 and collected greater than two million views, after San Marino had completed their Euro 2024 qualifying group by dropping each sport.
Fittingly, the mysterious unnamed determine behind the account was impressed to set it up as a result of he could not discover anyplace else posting English updates on San Marino’s fortunes.
“I’m interested in footballing micro-states, but San Marino always had and has a special place in my heart,” he tells Sky Sports activities. “When San Marino score, I normally get about 5,000 extra followers.
“It would not get a lot, if any recognition from contained in the nation. However that is positive, the gamers have to focus on making the nation proud. X isn’t actually a factor in Italy nor San Marino, so I believe they barely realise the love they get on-line.”
With the keyboard-mashing tweets of joy normally accompanying those consolation goals, or if they were very fortunate an occasional goalless draw, no-one inside or out of the country was prepared for any genuine success.
Across four matches between September and November, San Marino picked up a first ever competitive victory, added a second with their debut away win, and enjoyed their finest hour in November in Liechtenstein, coming from behind to win 3-1 and send the largest shockwaves you can fit through a country slightly larger than Middlesbrough.
“It is a gorgeous emotion in spite of everything these years of defeats,” stalwart Vitaioli tells Sky Sports, still emotional almost a month on. “We had been welcomed as heroes in San Marino. It was unimaginable.”
Aged 17, he became San Marino’s youngest ever player in 2007 and is now the squad’s elder statesman at 35 after 103 caps, 97 losses, five draws and, following a five-minute cameo at the end of that Liechtenstein game, one win – almost an entire career in the making.
“It’s one thing so large for us that maybe we nonetheless have not understood what actually occurred,” he adds. “It repays all of the sacrifices we have now made in all these years.
“We knew we were playing well, but to get promoted to the next league up – that still felt like a dream. But sometimes, dreams come true, especially if you never give up.”
All of the manifestation in San Marino couldn’t make a rustic’s dream come true by itself. Two-hundred and fifty miles away from the house of the Pope, divine intervention felt a extra real looking help. Or, because it turned out, UEFA.
The governing physique’s mind little one, the Nations League, has levelled the enjoying subject for smaller nations, and never earlier than time.
In two qualifying tournaments earlier than the inaugural competitors launched in 2018, the Sammarinese had conceded 90 objectives and scored 3 times in 20 matches, selecting up a solitary draw in opposition to Estonia.
However that new platform alone can’t clarify their ascent both. San Marino’s Nations League group 4 years in the past additionally contained Liechtenstein and Gibraltar, they usually completed backside with two attracts and two losses. They conceded solely 3 times, however didn’t handle a single purpose themselves.
The principle roots of their second within the solar stretch again a decade to a UEFA-funded funding in infrastructure together with a generational revamp of the nationwide stadium and a brand new hub for the San Marino Academy, which operates youth sides as much as U19 degree. Seven of the most-recent San Marino squad are graduates.
“UEFA’s support has been crucial,” San Marino FA president Marco Tura stated after their Nations League triumph. “It changed our mentality and vision of football.
“UEFA guided us in each step of our organisational and technical growth, enabling us to boost soccer’s degree not simply economically but additionally structurally and technically.”
One thing UEFA could not supply was the right manager to take advantage of the brightest crop of young players the country has ever produced.
Fabrizio Costantini laid much of the ground work after stepping up from the U21s to the national side in 2022, lowering the average age of the squad considerably and briefly equalising against Denmark in October last year before Yussuf Poulsen’s winner averted the mother of all shocks and one broken caps lock.
His successor, Roberto Cevoli, has taken things to new heights, naming the youngest average international line-up across Europe in 2024.
The rewards have not taken long to bear fruit with 24-year-old Nicola Nanni the standout star of this Nations League campaign, netting a last-minute penalty to earn a draw in Gibraltar in their penultimate match before scoring to complete the turnaround in Vaduz last month.
“All credit has to go to the manager’s approach,” Vitaioli provides. “He has been a real breath of fresh air and brought new motivation to the team.”
In all probability, this can be nearly as good because it will get for Sammarinese, given Albania, Finland and doubtlessly Slovakia – all sides who’ve certified for current tournaments – await them in League C of the 2026/27 Nations League.
By then, there’s nonetheless an opportunity as small because the nation itself that a spot on the 2026 World Cup is perhaps on the playing cards.
4 Nations League group winners who end outdoors of the highest two of their World Cup qualifying teams can be added into the play-offs subsequent November for considered one of 4 spots within the finals.
There’s a real looking probability San Marino could also be amongst them, although them profitable two extra video games to make it to the USA, Canada and Mexico feels little greater than a dream. However then – that is how they obtained right here within the first place.
