Best team so far. Great to watch, unusually for them. If they can cut out the cynical fouls when caught on the break, they could go all the way.
On the evidence of tonight they're going to play much better teams than Belgium but they were pretty good. I'm not sure they're the best team so far but as always they just can't be written off.
Belgium were disappointing I agree. Though how much of that was down to how well Italy played? It will be interesting to see how they react against Ireland on Saturday. On today's evidence Ireland could definitely get something.
Unless Belgium improve they could could well be beaten by Eire and will struggle to qualify. After their poor world cup I was looking forwards to seeing them in this tournament but again they looked awful.
Old manned Belgium from start to finish. Although Belgiums tactics played straight into Italy's hands, why play through the middle when they were playing 3-5-2?
Belgium are the most overrated team in world football at the minute. They got a collection of very good players, but to my knowledge, haven't been able to beat a decent side when it has mattered. Italy played exactly how I expected Italy to play. Sideways. Until the opportunity arose to play the killer ball. They threatened it so many times prior to them scoring the first goal. What Chellini (sp) Bonnuci and De Rossi, lack in place and flair these days, they make up for with those obvious moments of quality and experience. They got the goal and then were content with passing the ball around and holding onto it. They gave it away often, which was rust from only playing tournament football once every 2 years, but Belgium rarely looked like hurting them. De Bruyne in particular was woeful. Oddly enough, Italy seemed to get their 2nd by outnumbering Belgium at the back, which was strange as Belgium didn't seem to throw that many forward in the previous attack. I literally think they gave up by the end. No surprise that Italy won, but Belgium were poor. Italy were typically Italian. Sent from my SM-G900F using Tapatalk
It's by taking it in turns to commit these cynical fouls which will enable them to go all the way. Stopped 3 clear breakaways last night.
On the 3rd one (probably the most blatant) when 3 on 2 as the replay showed the Italian having a piggyback ride, as Clatterberg brandished the yellow card, my wife, (who has absolutely NO interest in football and doesn't understand it that well) looked up from her knitting and said "That should be a senfing off". When I pointed out the rule that there must be a clear goalscoring opportunity,one defending player etc, she said "The rules are wrong then!" Actually she made a good point that cynical fouls and yellow cards where a break is on like that should be cumulative regardless of who commits them so on the 3rd one, even if the cynical pullback is commited by 3 different players on the same side, it should be a red!! Thinking about it 2 yellows followed by a red for repetitive fouling like that over the halfway line could work. Actually, dare I say it, Clatterberg had a good game. Loved the bored expression when he went to Rossi after his Oscar winning dying-swan act when the slo-mo showed him throwing himself backwards after a slight touch and rolling around in agony. He tried something similar again later and Clatterberg just ignored him.
Give over Germany looked streets ahead to me. Organised off the ball, pacey in possession and ruthless infront of goal.
I did consider that, but it will hurt once the suspensions kick in if they carry on like that - remember Cameroon in 1990 were decimated by the time we played them in the quarter finals.
