At 7:45pm on Thursday night, at the same time as Wales take on Bosnia and Herzegovina at Cardiff City Stadium, Italy will host Northern Ireland at The New Balance Arena - home to Serie A side Atalanta - in Bergamo in the other play-off semi-final in path A.
Few are giving Michael O'Neill's men any hope of progressing into the final, and that in itself could work in Northern Ireland's favour.
Stuart Dallas - who won 62 caps for his country - told the BBC: "Michael's squad is young and energetic. They can relish the opportunity, and they will be quietly confident of causing an upset.
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"Italy maybe aren't as strong as what they once were, but they are still a big nation with quality players throughout their side.
"But the pressure is all on them to not miss out on a third World Cup in a row, so Northern Ireland have nothing to fear, nothing to lose and everything to gain."
Craig Bellamy has previously warned that Northern Ireland are no mugs, and, as Dallas mentioned, the Azzurri are not what they used to be.
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Indeed, the four-time world champions have not reached the finals of a World Cup since 2014 and suffered a shock home semi-final loss to North Macedonia four years ago.
But for all of the talk of Italy's struggles over recent years, which punctuate the monumental highlight of winning Euro 2021, Gennaro Gattuso still possesses a squad packed with talent.
Manchester City's Gianluigi Donnarumma, Arsenal's Riccardo Calafiori, Newcastle United's Sandro Tonali and Fiorentina's Moise Kean, formerly of Everton, Paris Saint-Germain and Juventus, are among the names that will be well-known to football fans on these shores.
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But Gattuso has heaps of Serie A talent at his disposal too, although he will be without Liverpool's Federico Chiesa who has withdrawn from the squad.
Having already been without Liverpool's Conor Bradley and Preston North End's Jamal Lewis through injury, Northern Ireland were dealt an additional blow ahead of the trip to Italy.
Sunderland's Dan Ballard has been ruled out due to a hamstring injury, with Blackburn Rovers defender Tom Atcheson earning his first senior call-up as a result.
Southampton midfielder Shea Charles, Preston midfielder Alistair McCann, Oxford United defender Brodie Spencer and Sheffield Wednesday goalkeeper Pierce Charles are all back in the squad while Liverpool's uncapped winger Kieran Morrison also features.
Their squad features plenty of English Football League talent too, including Swansea City's Ethan Galbraith, Hull City's Paddy McNair, Portsmouth's Terry Devlin, West Bromwich Albion's Isaac Price and Paul Smyth from Queens Park Rangers.
The Italians will likely dictate proceedings in the semi-final, and there is no doubt the visitors will need to be clinical on the likely rare occasions they do find themselves in promising positions in front of goal.
But crucially, as Dallas mentioned, the pressure will lie solely on the shoulders of the home side, as O'Neill was also keen to stress.
"For them, they've purposely maybe tried to take a little bit of that pressure away from themselves by playing the game in Bergamo," the 56-year-old told BBC Sport Northern Ireland.
"They've missed out in the last two World Cups, which is kind of unheard of for Italy, and there's massive expectation and pressure on them."
The focus of the Wales squad will have been solely on their own tough test against Bosnia and Herzegovina.
But, should the dream scenario unfold in Cardiff on Thursday night, Bellamy's focus will swiftly switch to analysing the victor from the contest between two very different but nonetheless tricky opponents who themselves could create real headlines in Bergamo.
