You'd think that winning your qualifying group for the European Championships would bode well for your chances heading in, especially when that group contained one team coming off an appearance in the World Cup final (France), another team that made it to the knock out stage (Ukraine), and a pesky-as-shit Scottish side that fought until its last minute of play to try to steal a spot this summer.
Oh, and you also happen to currently hold the title of World Champions.
That ought to make you one of the favorites, either that or the fact that you are one of the favorites in seemingly every international tournament ever because you are Italy.
None of that, however, means much in terms of performance on the pitch and gauging by current form of some of the Azzurri's key players, it'd be hard to consider them a lock for anything. Hell, having drawn France (again) and the Netherlands, Italy might struggle getting out of Group C.
But the two players who arguably had the most to do with Italy taking home the last World Cup, eh, they donta looka sogood.
Fabio Cannavaro has had a pretty sub-par campaign at Real Madrid and Andrea Pirlo has been equally as unspectacular at Milan this season.
And is Roberto Donadoni going to leave Del Piero off the squad again? After being in Ranieri's dog house earlier this season at Juve, Del Piero has turned it around and had a bit of a renaissance, but what that means for this summer is anyone's guess.
So maybe Italy has some question marks.
But they do still have maybe the world's best keeper in Gigi Buffon. Actually there is no maybe about it, as Buffon tops the IFFHS' list of best goal keepers of the last 20 years (he shares the ranking with Peter Schmeichel). And they have a scoring machine in Luca Toni who, to this point, has 35 goals across all competitions in his first Bundesliga campaign. Plus his WAG is fucking hot (even if she's NSFW).
The Italians have their bulldog in the midfield in Gattuso, and in the 4-3-3 (than can be a 4-5-1) employed by Donadoni, Camoranesi (who better have learned the words to the national anthem by this point), will have to work pretty hard going box-to-box and falling back if and when Italy grab leads. So he could be the maybe the most important guy on the pitch. Still, they don't need to be spectacular in the midfield, just technically solid and they can probably find a way to disrupt the Dutch and the Romanians. France will be trickier.
So who knows? Italy were massive fucking failures in 2004, having entered as favorites only to not get out of their group after draws with Denmark and Sweden. But when they had lower expectations in Germany in 2006 they, you know, won.
They are going to need a result in their opener against the Dutch. And you can probably pencil in a W against Romania. Even then, 4 points probably won't be enough and it will come down to the match against France.
Seems sort of inevitable.
Breakout player: I can't even be sure either of these guys will make the squad, but one of the forwards from Udinese, either Di Natale or Quagliarella will be the difference between Italy advancing or not (I'd err on the side of the former who has 5 goals in 17 national team appearances).
Biggest question mark: Again, Pirlo and Cannavaro. Lean more on the latter as age (he'll be just shy of 35 by tournament's end) might be catching up to him.
Worst player: Materazzi is the card magnet, but I'm less a fan of Ambrosini, too many wasted touches in midfield. I'd also personally feed De Rossi a bowl of dicks for his cheap shot on Brian McBride in the '06 Cup.
Who's the coach (and is he as racist as Aragonés?): Roberto Donadoni. Lippi took a "sabbatical" after the World Cup by not renewing his contract and Donadoni stepped in to immediately begin sucking. He started 0-2-1 with loses to Croatia and France and a home draw to Lithuania. He did manage to right the ship and win the group, but there is still some unease in the Italian press over his selection. Of course the Italian press would have unease over Jesus selecting Lazarus to raise from the dead (certainly there's someone more deserving, no?). Personally, I don't think anyone who played in the MLS will skipper a Euro champion in my lifetime. I also don't think I put enough thought into that statement to back it up.
Could England beat this team? Nope. Not even with their Italian manager, but maybe after a couple of questionable cards on Materazzi.
Can this team win it all? And what is their ready made excuse if they don't? Would anyone be that surprised if Italy pulled it together and found a way to emerge from their group and then engineer a couple of results to get to the final? No, they would not. Their excuse if they don't? See the question about the coach.
Tuesday, April 29, 2008
Euro 2008 Team Profiles: Italy - More Confusing Than A Woman Right Now
Tuesday, April 22, 2008
Totti proves he is indeed made of glass
Francesco Totti -your basic good looking, talismanic Roma striker- hurt his knee in Sunday's 1-1 draw with Livorno, which basically handed the Scudetto to massively uninspiring Inter Milan. Its unfortunate as Totti had recovered from whatever ailed him against Man U (sore vag) to score a cracking goal against Catania in the midweek. After surgery on Monday, it was confirmed that he will be out for four months, which rules him out of Euro 2008. But Totti's pain may turn out to be a certain Val Kilmer lookalike's gain (sorry, that was a ugly sentence).
Tuesday, March 4, 2008
Cassano takes crazy pills
Well, it was bound to happen.
After I sang the praises of Sampdoria striker Antonio Cassano last week, he managed get himself red carded and threw one hell of a temper tantrum on Sunday. Apparently he remains as combustible as advertised. Hey, but he did score the equalizer against Torino.
You want genius, sometimes you have to live with insanity.
YouTube goodness after the jump.
Va fanculo indeed, Mr. Referee.
Ummm, yeah. So he's still a little crazy. But intensity is good, right Mr. Donadoni? Actually if Cassano keeps this us there is probably not much hope for a call up to the Azzuri squad this summer. Even his prospective teammates are throwing him under the bus. Juve midfielder Mauro Camoranesi told reporters that:“Cassano has exceptional quality,” the Argentine-born winger admitted. "But I wouldn’t have wanted him in the World Cup squad in Germany – that’s all I’m going to say.”
Sour grapes people, sour grapes. Since we love a little crazy here at UF HQ, we are now officially endorsing Cassano for Euro 2008, and our new weekly "CassanoWatch" feature will monitor his progress.
Tuesday, January 29, 2008
An Open Letter to the Italian Serie A
Dear Serie A:
Look, we've never been close. In fact, we barely see each other. It'd be hard to call our relationship even platonic. And I'm going to blame you. I know it's shallow and selfish of me, but admit it, you haven't always been the prettiest thing to look at.
Is Elvis Costello a Serie A watcher? I'm not sure how else he came up with a title like "All This Useless Beauty."
Because I go way back with Italian soccer. The Azzurri are my people. Okay, they are my dad's people. But that still makes you half my people.
One of my first memories of me and you is Paulo Rossi in the 1982 World Cup. A hat trick to knock out favorites Brazil almost single handedly. Then his second half strike against West Deutschland in the final opened up a deluge at the Bernabeu from which the Alles could never Uber come.I even died a little inside in 1994, even though I thought Roberto Baggio was a complete douche with that rat tail and deserved to sky that PK alone for sporting one of those.
And Holy Shit if you knew the spoils I had won from making wholly inappropriate bets for the 2006 Final with the two French girls I know back home in Texas.
In fact I almost feel like I owe you for the semi-final match from that Cup. You were so good to me that day. When I really needed it, you were there for me. Man, that was awesome. Just as taut as 120 minutes of football can be. You more or less played attacking football, or at least you played to win. You didn't just pay Lippi service to that idea. You had actually changed. And I felt like you changed for me.
Then to top it off with Fabio Grosso's strike, that was a thing of beauty. If I were a wuss of a man, I might have cried. Instead I got super, super drunk.
It's a little late in coming, but you know what they say about late and never. Yes, there is a large difference between International and Club soccer, but I'm willing to give the Serie A—and, yep, I'm going to use the c-word—a chance.
The only problem is that I need to be wooed. I know you've been wanting me for a while, so somebody step up and win my affection. I can't do it myself.
If I chase after Inter am I not just front-running after the prettiest girl in the class? And Milan, who looked so good last year, might have been rode too hard and put away a little wet. Plus, I'm not a Jesus freak. That just seems like a problem waiting to happen. I could maybe even see myself with Torino, Siena, or Parma. For me, your going down isn't a problem at all. You could come back up and go right back down again. I'd like that.
What I'm saying is that I'm open, but I can't be the aggressor. The ball is on your half of the pitch.
Flowers and candy will get you nowhere. A good solid blow job? That will go far. And if you're Roma, I suggest starting with Totti's wife. Ilary Blasi makes Jessica Alba look like Ann Richards.
Soon to be someone's truly,
Precious Roy
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