Italy's most obvious missing player from my perspective was Fabio Grosso. For years Italy's bread and butter had been down that left side.
He, like many others, has seen his best days. He had a poor season with Juve which was foreseeable given that he was poor at Lyon. Even De Ceglie (who is mediocre at best) was and is being preferred to him at Juve.
I'm not saying that Grosso should have been there, only that his absence was VERY noticeable. His contribution to an already shaky Azzurri offense was huge and missing that was tremendous. If the creativity was not going to come from Grosso (who wasn't there) or Pirlo (who was injured) then where was it going to come from? *That* is what I meant when I suggested that Lippi didn't really seem to have a gameplan.
Lippi is a great coach, no doubt about it but he let his personal issues get in the way of the team, and his gameplan was basically to leave Cassano, Balotelli and anyone who he didn't personally like off the team. That WC was a failure before it began!
Yeah, Lippi all of a sudden after winning a World Cup, a Toyota Cup, Champions League, and five scudettos all of a sudden AT ONCE stopped knowing how to coach a football team.
So you are faulting Lippi for not taking a Grosso that you acknowledge was out of form? You are essentially blaming the manager for not having the benefit of a player who physically could not perform at the same levels he did four years prior. This is yet another example of a completely illogical criticism of Lippi. The man has been demonized going into and following the World Cup, with a lot of fair criticism; but the lengths to which people go to discredit him are just astonishing.
He won his World Cup on PKs and a dodgy penalty against Australia and was winning Scudetti with Juventus really that tough when he was at the helm? And anyway, I'm not saying he's never been a good manager. Only that he was not a good manager this past summer. These big ego guys sometimes buy into their greatness a bit too much and it gets the best of them. I adore Tommy Lasorda but I think he gave Fernando too many innings. It's nothing personal against these guys that I have never met...
Nicky only said Lippi had no gameplan, which is something i'd be inlcined to agree with. He was still experimenting with formations and players just before the start of the tournament ffs!
Not at all, as I thought I had made pretty clear when I said "I'm not saying that Grosso should have been there." What I am saying is that Pirlo and Grosso were basically the major creators of the Azzurri sides the last few seasons and, if they're not going to be there, you better have some sorta farging plan for creating goals without those two. He didn't.
And Brazil got their fourth against us on PKs; does anyone ever slight Brazil like they do us? And against Australia, did you forget that we were down a man nearly the entire game and Australia still couldn't score? "I'm not saying he's never been a good manager. Only that he was not a good manager this past summer. " That statement doesn't seem consistent with your others where you seem to imply that he was either always incompetent or the beneficiary of favorable circumstances. I agree with your quote here.
Well he routinely changed formations (and players) at the 2006 WC and I don't hear anyone complaining about that. The selection he fielded, which he was admittedly responsible for, was generally poor; I don't think it was for lack of a game plan.
Grosso isn't really creative. He had a habit of getting himself into dangerous positions going forward, but still with no service...
Going into the 2006 WC we had 2 formations, the 4-3-1-2 (with Totti) and the 4-3-3 (with ADP). We played these systems throughout qualifying and the players were used to it. Granted, he made an adjustment during the latter stages of the tournament by dropping a striker and adding an extra midfielder, but it's hardly comparable to this summer just gone where he used 3 different formations in 3 different games (in addition to making half time subs in each game) in the hope of finding the right one.
He could cross and really it seemed like >50% of Italy's attacks went through him the last few years. Anyone reading the Italian NT forum would think that the reason Italy was the suck this WC (and they were) was because of Gilardino and Iaquinta and that's just complete and utter nonsense. Good coaches put their players in a position to be successful and Lippi clearly did not this time around. That's all I'm saying.
We had plenty of crosses during the WC, usually they just got headed out by the opposition. Most of our attacks went through Pirlo.
He didn't 'routinely' change systems, and at least they were between two systems that had worked in qualifying (well, the 4-3-1-2 at least, that was the major system in qualifying; the 4-4-1-1 came in as a more solid system later on in the tournament). Big difference between: Ghana: 4-3-1-2 USA: 4-3-1-2 Czechs: 4-4-1-1 Australia: 4-3-1-2 (I think he was trying to switch it to 4-3-3 at half by putting in Iaquinta for Gilardino; sending off put a dent in that) Ukraine: 4-4-1-1 Germany: 4-4-1-1 France: 4-4-1-1 and: Paraguay: 4-2-3-1 1st half; 4-4-2 2nd half New Zealand: 4-4-2 1st half, 4-3-3 2nd half Slovakia: 4-3-3 first half, 4-4-2 2nd half More games in the first set of course, but changing systems every 45 minutes is not good at all. The changing of players in 06 was more due to necessity (suspensions and injury) than by 'trying to figure out what the hell was going to work' like in 2010. In 2006, you basically knew the best XI besides one or two spots at least 7-8 months before the tournament.
Ya he won alot...but at the same time he left a bunch of talent back home,i find it hard to defend him
That's not necessarily true. There was a great deal of player rotation unrelated to injury/suspension. If I'm not mistaken, only two or three of the 23 he took didn't play, and that includes backup keepers. If you follow Lippi's career, both club and country, formation/squad rotation has always been usual with him. Only now that his team was shit in the last World Cup does it equate to him not having a game plan. I just can't see how that was the case. He criticized the squad for being to direct, which meant that he wanted more possession-based play. The fact that it didn't work out doesn't mean that Lippi didn't have any idea what to do. I'm not making excuses for the guy. He clearly made mistakes at the last World Cup; but I think some of the criticisms of him are just not based in fact or logic.
Everyone bar Amelia and Peruzzi played, but the only few times I can think of where a change was made from one game to the next for reasons other than suspension/injury was dropping Toni vs. the Czechs and dropping Totti vs. Australia, but whatever, this isn't really important. I can't see a specific 'gameplan' or system at any point in these last two years though, besides unabashedly playing 4-3-3 for no good reason, and then start experimenting away from it only weeks before the tournament.
And that game-plan was.. to see how badly a World Champion coach fail in defending the crown. Mission accomplished. Lippi 2010 is probably the worst coaching preformance I've ever seen by anyone, at any level, in any sport, in my life.
Even though I am angry and pissed off that Balotelli can no longer play for my country Ghana, I agree him playing for Italy is for the best, and that he is the future of Azzurri football but only if you guys call him for EURO 2012 and for Brazil 2014, if you guys don't call him for either one of those tournaments, then Italy will falter. Italy under Prandelli, you guys know what you need to do, take the Germany approach to your guys' national team, what I mean by that is that you guys remodel your squad like how Germany did with youth Display youth within the Azzurri, make it a young team again with youngsters, but still have a few experienced players in your national team That is all I am saying about this issue