We’ve seen all 16 teams at Euro 2012 – eight twice – and few
have been more impressive than Italy, who can take a big step towards the quarter
finals by beating Croatia in their Group C encounter today.
Playing a 3-5-2 formation (with Daniele De Rossi dropping in
between two natural centre backs to operate as a sweeper) that had been decided
upon only recently – something of a surprise for many given how they’d decided
upon it only a week ago, coinciding with the injury to highly rated centre back
Andrea Barazagil - but it made perfect
sense with 6 Juventus players in the squad playing that system under Antonia Conte all
season – and they were more impressive than many had expected on the ball, with
Maggio, Pirlo, Marchisio, Balotelli and Cassano especially all doing excellent jobs
despite having just 34% possession against Spain - the lowest percentage in the
opening round of games.
Despite that Iker Casillas was forced into 5 decent saves - especially
from Pirlo’s freekick and Thiago Motta’s header – while Mario Balotelli’s
breakthough (when allowing Italy’s centrebacks to catchup to him) was a sign of
things to come when substitute Di Natale (pictured in brilliant style left by Alex Grimm of Getty Images) went straight through on goal and
scored the opener a couple of minutes later.
Spain pegged them back straight away and had their chances
to win the game but there’s no shame in that and while Croatia will be no
pushovers, they should see much more of the ball here and present a large enough
threat to beat Croatia and put one foot in the quarter finals.
Croatia themselves got off to an absolute flyer when beating
the Irish 3-1 and will be greatly encouraged by a head to head record that has
seen them go unbeaten in their five games against Italy, winning three of those
matches, but times change and this will be a fierce test of Slaven Billic’s men.
They were undoubtedly well worth their win against Ireland –
they dominated the corner count 7-1 and had 55% of possession, while Ireland’s
freekick was a dubious one and even more dubiously scored – but Italy’s defence
and midfield will be far harder to get past even for the likes of Luka Modric,
who was superb throughought the game against Ireland. There was also a feeling
that Ireland froze up in the big moment and lacked concentration when conceding
two of their three goals towards headers – an area that you wouldn’t imagine
Italy themselves would be too afraid of given that they let in just two goals
throughought the whole of qualifying, although they have the third shortest
squad in the competition compared to a Croatian side with an average of 6 foot –
something that you wouldn’t expect the Italians to do.
With forwards like Manduzik and Jelavic though, they can definitely
pose a big threat and them getting on the scoresheet – as they’ve done in 5 of
their last 6 games – looks to be a real possibility, so the 4/1 generally on
offer about Italy winning without a clean sheet looks to be an excellent source
of value, while the 1-1 draw (which has happened in 4 games so far this
toruanment) leaves both teams in an excellent position and looks to be a good
hedge against disappointment, while both teams to score is a hugely tempting
bet at 21/10, although for now we’ll side with Italy to smaller, value seeking
stakes.
Advice
1 pt Both teams to score & Italy to win (4/1 Ladbrokes)
1 pt 1-1 draw (11/2 general)
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