Okay, I got it wrong then. Would still like to play you guys in KO rounds sometime. It would turn into a classic, guaranteed!!
I pray to god that England doesn't get knocked out before we get a shot at them. So we can shut up all their experts ourselves.. like the genius Gary Neville.
We caught a lot of these pundits and “experts” by surprise. Everyone knew we were going to play well, but not this well. From guys like Neville and Veira it’s complete cope. Part of him probably fears an Italy v England match. We might play Belgium and lose. But I’m completely confident we can give them a close game especially after their performance today.
If Denmark took 1/5 of their chances they would have won today. May mean nothing long term, but there certainly seemed weaknesses that can be exploited there.
They were necessary with that team. It over performed because of him. For that he gets credit, but he wouldn't be appropriate for this team.
Any news on the extent of Chiellini’s injury? I haven’t seen/read anything. From what it looked like on TV, it didn’t seem like whatever was bothering him completely went. It almost seemed like he knew or felt something worse would happen if he continued, so he decided to shut it down there and then. With his history of injuries, it’s completely plausible that he took himself off (1) for precautionary reasons and (2) because his head would've been preoccupied with whatever was bothering him rather than 100% focused on the match.
Chiellini will be undergoing tests in Florence tomorrow. Probably won't be available until the second round match but I'm betting he will miss that game too.
It's been a while trying to keep up with Calcio and tactics in general. But if I remember correctly Conte style was a fluid 3/5 /2 ( that could morph right back into a 5 / 3 / 2 , tight defense with all players and hitting back on the counter. From what I remember with that team we really didn't have a traditional number 10 or playmaking midfielder to play up high. He used what was available to him in the best way possible. Fair to say? With that said that was probably one of our weakest teams in generations to play in a major tournament, but he got the most out of them. And that weak team was still able to best Spain and take Germany to penalties in which we really should have taken them. Supposedly Belgium was a team that was supposed to be the best in the tournament and we handled them 2 nel and we beat Sweden in the group one nel. All things considered quite remarkable. Never count Italy out. We are always an enigma. Always have been and always will be. Stroke of misfortune could see us out in the knockout round , but just a tiny stroke of fortune can get us all the way to the final and win it , as for all teams with historical pedigree. Which brings me to my final point. Look at Portugal in that Euro. They could not manage a win in the group phase and with how things played out got a much easier route to the final one could argue. But they won't admit that. With that said cheers to them you can only play the teams in front of you and work with the rules given However they will draw parallel of the best 3rd place ranked teams of World Cup 1994 where Italy made it to the final, but with that said in the World Cup 1994 Italy still managed a win , loss and a draw . Not 3 straight draws against the likes of Hungary, Iceland and Austria. Also just like in World Cup 86 90 and 94 a win back then only registered as 2 points , as opposed to 3 in 1998 when it began. Italy in 1994 with a win , loss and draw was 3 pts If it was the same situation in 1998 it would be 4 pts If memory serves me the best third placed teams usually had to have around a win ( at least one win for tiebreaker ) , loss and draw to make it to the KOs in 94 , 90 and 86 ( if teams were tied on points at three points they would go to number of wins for tiebreaker as a win , loss and draw would beat 3 draws when tied at 3 pts ) . Which is why I cant stand awarding the best 3rd placed teams now with the win being 3 pts and the draw still being 1 pt . You're awarding mediocrity since a win counts as three points as opposed to two prior to WC1998 and Euro 1996. Euro 1996 they began with a win as 3 pts. UEFA uses Head to Head as the initial tiebreaker which is what saw us out even though we had the better goal differential than the Czech Republic. Ironically that missed penalty against Germany in the group phase ended up really biting us as Germany ended up winning that Euro
I'm really curious how Conte's Italy would've faired against France that year. What do you think? If we went to semis instead of Germany, do you think we could've beat France? That was before France had Mbappe. Honestly I don't think we would've beaten the 2018 World Cup France, but 2016 France maybe?