Gianluigi Buffon deserved so much better than an inglorious exit

Gianluigi Buffon has surely run out of tears by now.

The disheartening defeat in the Champions League final this past summer was a bitter pill - that was his best chance to capture an elusive trophy that, in all likelihood, will go down as the only major piece of silverware to escape his grasp. He cried then, as Juventus supporters did alongside him.

This was different, though. Italy's stunning failure to qualify for the 2018 World Cup this week, courtesy of a meek 1-0 loss to Sweden over two uninspiring play-off legs, brought the revered goalkeeper's international career to an end.

Related - The future is now: What Italy must do to recover from World Cup disaster

Just like that.

The realization that this was real, that it was over, was jarring. No more passionate, lung-busting renditions of the Italian anthem from the man who has turned that pre-match ritual into an art form over the last two decades. Sobering, isn't it?

Next year's tournament was meant to be Buffon's Azzurri farewell. Instead, it arrived suddenly, some seven months ahead of schedule.

As they did in Cardiff, his emotions came pouring out in Milan after the final whistle on Monday.

Iker Casillas, almost immediately, lent his support to his tearful peer: "I don't like seeing you like this at all! I want to see you as usual, as you continue to be for many: a LEGEND. Proud to meet you and proud of having faced you many times," the Spaniard, a behemoth of the game in his own right, wrote on Twitter.

That, while touching, wasn't surprising. Goalkeepers, more so than any other positional group, share an intimate bond. They console and congratulate one another whenever warranted. Something about the lonely nature of the job, perhaps - outfield players simply don't understand what it's like, they'll say.

Buffon, though, is the type of transcendent force that garners respect and affection from everyone. Even those, as it turned out, whom he has foiled so many times throughout his remarkable career. Lukas Podolski and Franck Ribery, defeated by Buffon in the semi-finals and, of course, the tense final of the 2006 World Cup, lauded the shot-stopper after Italy was ousted. The Frenchman deemed him an "idol for every player."

Some of this, of course, is simply the product of longevity. On a sporting level, it's darn near impossible not to respect someone whose international career spanned 20 years and 175 caps, regardless of where your allegiances lie.

But so much more of it is down to Buffon, the person.

His thoughtfulness, his openness, and the class with which he carries himself. The little things - like taking time out during his holidays to play in goal for a group of children in the park, or clapping for the Swedish national anthem to counteract the 70,000 Italians ferociously (and stupidly) booing it - add up.

In the wake of Francesco Totti and Andrea Pirlo's respective retirements, Buffon alone is the great unifying presence of Italian football: Juventini, Milanisti, Romanisti, and Napoletani bicker and trade barbs, but Gigi is untouchable. On that, they all agree. The tears that flowed throughout Italy on Monday were as much for him as they were for the nation's humiliation at missing a first World Cup since 1958.

And while he was entitled to cry for selfish reasons - qualification would have seen him set a record by appearing in the tournament for a sixth (and final) time - he didn't. His disappointment was more profound than that.

"I am not sorry for myself but for all of Italian football," he told RAI after the match. "We failed at something which is also something on a social level. This is the regret, not that it has ended for me, because time rules and it passes."

He said he didn't want young children watching to see him crying, lest they have second thoughts about representing the national team in the future. The 39-year-old tried to fight back tears during what was, ostensibly, his retirement announcement. He failed. Not even Buffon can stop everything.

"I will definitely leave the national team to the right guys behind me that will have their say, (Gianluigi) Donnarumma and (Mattia) Perin, that will make me not regret the decision."

Fitting. In a moment where everyone wanted to talk only about him, he focused instead on his teammates, praising those with the immense task of filling his boots, and shedding tears for the other grizzled stalwarts whose Azzurri careers also ended with an inglorious thud.

"I want to give a hug to everyone, to my Chiello (Giorgio Chiellini), to my Barza (Andrea Barzagli), to my Leo (Leonardo Bonucci), and my Lele (Daniele De Rossi). I wish the best luck to these guys, whose example can be followed."

That's precisely why he's held in such high esteem, and why many in the football world - aside from, understandably, those in Sweden - wanted to see him between the sticks next summer in Russia.

Of course, footballers shouldn't be rewarded, be it with victories, individual accolades, titles, or in this case, a perfect swan song, simply because it would be poetic. Make no mistake: Sweden, through organised, dogged, and sometimes last-gasp defending - plus a slice of fortune in Solna, via De Rossi's unfortunately placed leg - fully merits its place in Russia.

Italy, meanwhile, truly earned the spot on the couch that awaits come June.

But not Gigi Buffon. He deserved better.

He warranted a more skilled manager than Gian Piero Ventura, who, through equal parts incompetence (see: his woeful tactics) and insecurity (see: his baffling personnel decisions), conspired to make a legitimately exciting crop of Italian talent look dull and lifeless.

Related: Ventura's incompetence the sole reason Italy isn't World Cup-bound

The Azzurri attack had the cutting-edge of a spoon over two legs against the resolute Swedes; an inanimate object might actually have proved a more useful bench boss than the unqualified 69-year-old. Maybe then Lorenzo Insigne, Italy's most electrifying attacker, who possesses precisely the skill set needed to unlock a tightly-packed backline, would have been on the pitch, and not stapled to a cooler beside the San Siro dugout.

That a devastated Buffon, seconds after the final whistle, faced the cameras on behalf of his team and his country, while Ventura cowered and avoided them, is the most stark example of each man's worth.

Buffon also deserved better than Carlo Tavecchio, a pustule of a president who, prior to hiring Ventura, won election to his position as head of the FIGC despite racist remarks claiming "banana eaters" were ruining Serie A by limiting opportunities for young Italian players.

During the qualifying campaign, Tavecchio described the prospect of Italy missing the world's biggest quadrennial spectacle as an "apocalypse." As it turns out, he was one of the horsemen. Ventura has, mercifully, been fired. Tavecchio, unfortunately, remains in power despite ample calls for his resignation.

After everything Buffon has given Italian football over his two decades of sparkling service, it failed him.

"Football works in strange ways," the beloved goalkeeper said earlier this year, prior to that aforementioned Champions League final. "As is true in the rest of life, those who are deserving usually get their just rewards in the end."

Usually, yes. But, clearly, not always.

(All photos courtesy: Getty Images)