Last night's victory has certainly given the group a better look from an Italian point of view. Coupled with Scotland's loss in Ukraine, it means we sit only two points behind the leaders going into the winter break in international matches.
To be honest, it wasn't the greatest performance - in my opinion, we played worse than on Saturday, but that matters not a lot at the moment. The important thing was to get a victory out of this tricky away fixture and we managed that.
Looking at the match itself, De Rossi's opener was a good strike from 35 yards, but in truth, a decent keeper would have saved his shot. But then we seemed to sit back a little, and Georgia scored from their first shot on goal, before hitting the post with their second just before half time. In between, Toni had missed a sitter from 6 yards out.
The second half was looking pretty grim as it seemed our players - and the midfielders in particular - weren't entirely sure where they were meant to be playing, with Pirlo in particular looking out of sorts (though to be fair he hadn't trained since the Ukraine game due to a cold). But just as he was about to be subbed, the game turned when Pirlo was first fouled to get a man sent off, before a sublime reverse pass to Di Natale allowed him to cross for Camo to power a header into the bottom corner. From then on, we were in control, and Perrotta added a third via a deflection.
Overall, we did deserve to win, but it wasn't a vintage performance. But, as I say, who cares? We now sit third in the group, and Donadoni has 5 months to work on his tactics.
Both games this week have shown me enough to say Donadoni does deserve more time in the job. Di Natale, despite my skepticism, is a decent addition to the squad. But perhaps his best move - and the one that shows he is his own man - was his decision to drop Del Piero not just from the team, but even from the subs bench last night. Del Piero's days at this level are done, his lack of pace too much of a hinderance now. It was refreshing to see Donadoni took the hard decision to realise that.
Next up - Scotland, a match I fully intend to travel to. After reading more comments this morning that "Italy are there for the taking", I am even more determined to be there when we slot a couple of goals past them!
3 comments:
Come on - anyone with half a brain would never say that Italy are there for the taking.
You know and I know that Italy and France will qualify from this group but allow us Scots a wee bit of dreaming after the France result.
What I will say is that Scotland are very hard to score against (the 8-1-1 formation with Kenny Miller tracking back might have something to do with that) so you may have to be patient when you play us in March.
Maybe anyone with half a brain would see that - but there is still far too much nonsense I read about Italy being the team that Scotland can upset. It's a lack of respect, as Ginkers commented on in his blog, and whilst I am used to it by now, I had hoped that winning the world cup might actually cause people to give us SOME respect.
Evidently not, however, as everyone seems to think France, the team who LOST the world cup, are the best team in the group.
oooh I thought we were much better last night than on saturday. roma-tinted spectacles notwithstanding I thought the midfield functioned much better though as you say Pirlo was far from at his best. Toni was well out of sorts and so most noticeably was Cannavaro. still, we've got the points we need, and are now in a ok position with respect to the rest of the group. hopefully by march things will have settled down again.
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