"It's difficult if you go in with fear" — the meaning behind the word mentalità that Donnarumma spoke of after the match against France
A goalkeeper guards more than just the goal
On a night in Paris, Gianluigi Donnarumma stood in the Italy goal.
In matchday 3 of the UEFA Nations League group stage, France and Italy clashed in a match that ended 1-1.
Looking only at the result—conceding the opener to a Michael Olise free kick and equalising through Alessandro Bastoni—it might be dismissed simply as a "good fight."
But after the match, Donnarumma chose his words quietly yet firmly, focusing not on the result but on how the team had fought.
"We suffered. But it was the right kind of suffering."
The meaning of facing France away from home is something felt in the body before it shows up in the numbers.
Donnarumma repelled shot after shot from Camavinga, Rabiot, and an attack packed with world-class talent.
Asked about the toughest save of the match, he mentioned his reaction to Rabiot first, and recalled that responding to Camavinga also demanded judgment of the same high level.
It's clear from this that each save was the product of a completely different split-second read of the situation.
The word Donnarumma kept returning to after the match was "mentalità."
Translated into English, it's close to "mentality" or "attitude," but I sense his use of the word carries a slightly deeper meaning.
If you enter with fear, it's difficult. But if you enter with the right attitude, you can fight anyone—behind these words lies an awareness that he is choosing how to fight.
It's a sense that they themselves can control not the result, but the way they step into the match.
Why Bastoni's goal was a "symbol"
Speaking about Bastoni's equaliser, Donnarumma said, "That goal represents everything about this team's attitude."
A defender pushing deep into France's territory, actively going for the goal.
Rather than deeming it "correct" to sit in a defensive block and endure, they chose to press forward with a high line.
Because the goal was born from that attitude, Italy's captain saw it as carrying a meaning beyond the mere result.
In football there is "how to defend" and, just as much, "how to attack"—and beneath both lies another layer: "with what attitude you stand on the pitch."
The moment Bastoni's goal was spoken of as a "symbol," it became clear that it was not merely a single goal but the crystallisation of the way the team had chosen to fight.
Four years with Paris, and what he let go of—and what remained
This match was played at the home stadium of Paris Saint-Germain, the club Donnarumma once belonged to.
He spoke of his four years in Paris, which ended with a Champions League title, and of the special feeling of returning to his old stadium, using the word "emotional."
Even as he called his former teammates "wonderful, special people," on the pitch he did everything he could to deny their goal.
This apparent contradiction, which is in fact no contradiction at all, reveals well the mental complexity of a top player.
Being able to properly separate emotion from role.
Or perhaps, it's precisely because he has emotion that he can concentrate on his role.
The laugh about "blowing" the free kick away
It's hard to say what Donnarumma could actually have done the moment Olise's free kick curled over the wall and into the net.
Afterwards, he spoke about the scene with a laugh, saying he "tried to blow it away."
It was a joke, of course, but there's something important in that single line.
Regarding the moment Pio Esposito was dragged down by an opponent in the wall, he accepted it calmly, saying, "Things like that happen."
Rather than blaming anyone for the goal or breaking it down tactically, he simply said, "The opponent scored a wonderful goal, that's all."
Not letting yourself be dragged down by what you can't control, and instead directing your attention to what you can.
That speed of switching gears has probably been cultivated over a long career, just as much as—or even more than—technical skill.
A single message sent by the captain
It was revealed that back in June, before an Italy match, Donnarumma had sent a message to the new manager.
When the appointment was announced, he reached out immediately as captain, telling him, "I'll help if you need it."
He concluded with a single line: "I thought it was the right thing to do as captain."
The message itself may have been a brief exchange.
But behind that action lay a decision to interpret the meaning of his role in his own way and act before being told to.
It shows that he understands the title of "captain" not as something received, but as something to be exercised.
Do you act because you're told to, or because you've judged for yourself?
That difference can carry great weight within an organisation.
The view from where a goalkeeper stands
The goalkeeper is the position that spends the most time "waiting" within a team.
Not directly involved in the flow of attack, he stands in front of the goal the whole time his teammates have the ball, continuing to prepare.
Even in moments when nothing is happening, he must keep his concentration and keep reading the next instant.
Seen from that position, the weight of the word "mentalità" that Donnarumma speaks of feels a little different.
The words "if you enter with fear, it's difficult" may come precisely from someone who knows that feeling better than anyone.
Whoever guards the goal always lives side by side with the possibility of conceding.
Even so, to keep standing on the pitch, what becomes the foundation isn't fear of the result, but trust in one's own judgment.
That night, in the Paris stadium, Donnarumma kept stopping France's attack as it tried again and again to break open the goal.
How many accumulated judgments that required, the scoreline doesn't show.
Bastoni's goal, Olise's free kick, the save against Rabiot.
In each of these, there is a choice each player made in that instant.
Not whether it was right or wrong, but what they thought, and what they chose.
The fascination of football lies in how that process is layered countless times within ninety minutes.
If you were standing in that moment yourself, what would you use as your basis for judgment?
Where does a team's "attitude" come from in the first place?
How might a single message sent by a captain change the mood of a team?
What the Paris night left behind wasn't only a 1-1 scoreline.
Attitude can be chosen, but fear never disappears
If you take the words "if you enter with fear, it's difficult" too literally, it starts to feel a bit constraining. Is there really any player who can step into a match with zero fear? Feeling nothing in the face of France's attack might actually be a sign of insufficient preparation.
The routines professional players carry out before a match aren't meant to erase tension, but to make it possible to perform the same movements even in a state of tension. Considering how many times Donnarumma's saves must have been repeated, his reactions that night can be seen less as a "product of courage" and more as an "accumulation of preparation."
If so, what he calls the "right attitude" isn't about erasing fear, but about having an axis of judgment so as not to be swallowed by it—and that, I think, is not something chosen on matchday, but something built up through practice.
To shape how you "enter" a match
- Before a match, decide on one thing: how you'll move in a given situation. Deciding in advance what you'll do regardless of the score makes your way of entering the match less likely to be swayed by the result.
- After playing, make it a habit to reflect not on the opponent or the result, but on "what you saw and what you chose." Once you can put it into words in a single sentence, your judgment tends to get faster the next time the same situation arises.
- When tension or anxiety surfaces, there's no need to try to erase it. That feeling is also proof that you've prepared for the match. Rather than trying to settle your feelings, remembering "what you're supposed to do" can sometimes be what changes how you enter.
Having followed the same player for more than twenty years, what I notice changing match after match is often less the technique than the "way of standing." Whether you get rattled in a big moment, or keep the same centre of gravity. Whenever I think back to the moment I noticed a certain player had changed, there was usually someone's words nearby, or a painful experience.
Is the right way to enter a match something that can be taught? Or is it something you find for yourself only after failing again and again? From where we watch, the answer is often invisible, and that's something that's stayed with me.
- What Mancini meant by "those 25 minutes in the second half," spoken amid boos after the 0-2 defeat
- Kayode starts, Bastoni returns, Tonali continues—the judgment behind Mancini's selections for the Italy squad in the match against Turkey
- How to turn a GK's "costly mistake" into growth—lessons in judgment and mental reset from Bento's 97th minute against Al Nassr vs Al Hilal, and Ronaldo's "time you can't win"
