Gah. At the beginning of the Italy v Sweden match I honestly thought Trapattoni had got it, Totti getting a 3 match ban for spitting at a player was actually a stroke of luck because it freed up a team that was more or less playing around him. With Del Piero playing in a more natural striking role, supporting Vieri and Cassano feeding balls into them Italy looked a far better team on paper. The addition of Gattuso also gave the team a much needed drive.
They played 45 minutes of football like gods. It was the true Italian game and the Swedes looked like bystanders rather than our opponents, with Cassano putting away just one of the many many chances we had.
Anyhow, we led by 1-0 at the half time, it could so easily have been 2-0 or even 3-0. However after only about another 10 minutes of playing this way Trapattoni pulled of Gattuso, Cassano, Del Piero and in their places brought in a load of midfielders. Italy went from playing with an attacking 4-2-1-2 with the midfield really providing excellent delivery to the strikers to a 4-5-1 defensive team. It was precisely what Trapattoni did in the World Cup which caused us to fail, Italy started playing on the defensive and ultimately, we let in a goal. We went from having the most inspiring team in the tournament to playing ‘boringball’ with Vieri hopelessly alone up front. Trapattoni cost us the win we deserved tonight, sure the Swedes stepped up their game in the 2nd half but it was the idiotic ‘sit back and defend’ mentality which pulled us down, just as it had in nearly every single other frikkin’ match Italy have played under Giovanni Trapattoni. Trapattoni did the same thing against South Korea and as soon as I saw Cassano leave the field I knew we were screwed.
I sincerely hope that Trapattoni will have learned something for this, he got a reprieve in the form of referee incompetence when Italy crashed out of the 2002 World Cup but this time there’s nothing to blame other than his own idiotic Seria A style coaching. Italy needs to play like they did in the first half for the entire game, sitting on your arse and defending a one goal lead doesn’t work at an international level anymore; it’s been clearly demonstrated time and time again in the past 10 years.
Better luck next game? No thanks, I’d rather have a better coach.
Later
John
Posted by John Swaine at June 18, 2004 11:13 PM | TrackBack