Defense 101

Alan, you come on here trying to make out as if I’m small minded and abusive. Damn right I’m abusive, I actually came on this blog for the first time yesterday to talk about Inzaghi playing in the next games for Italy. But to my surprise I saw a whole load of ex-con mf’s slagging off our national team. We did not award ourselves a penalty, the ref did. If you were awarded a penalty in same way, you’re telling me cahill would hold his hand up and say “No ref, I dived…do not give us the penalty” Course he wouldn’t so don’t blame our national team, blame neil, blame guus. I’m a fair person and I’m not racist as my girlfriend is australian but I’m very passionate about italian football and I’m very passionate about my country. So what if I live in the UK?

Posted from  United Kingdom

Alan you need a kick in the head to be honest. Your the one who has to go so I guess it’s you whos surfing for porn. Don’t worry about your mum catching you though coz she’s here with me.

FORZA ITALIA!!!

Posted from  United Kingdom

So you admit it was a dive Sunny. Excellent. We’re all in agreement. So what are you getting so excited about? If you don’t care if your team cheats, be proud of it! Don’t let your conscience make you so angry and abusive.

You don’t have to justify your behaviour to me, I don’t care if you’re racist or not. I don’t care if you fanatsize about some blonde, blue eyed aussie film actress as your girlfriend. All kids your age do it.

However, if you really want my respect, give up on your pathetic football team (the competition’s rife with corruption anyway) and support your rugby team. A loser team, but honest losers.

Posted from  Australia

Ok Sunny, I’ll admit it, I’m just winding you up. I agree all teams dive to get advantages. I aplogise too if Aussie abuse wrecked the victory for you. It was bad sportsmanship that came out of disappointment for our team. Many Aussies might suspect that that was our only shot at the finals for a while to come, which would have made the disappointment worse.

Good luck for the rest of the cup.

Posted from  Australia

Alan to be honest I don’t know how to take your comments…on one hand your giving me abuse and then on the other your wishing me luck, regardless I’m sure you’ve read most my posts to realise that I only take shots at people that take shots at me or the team. I actually like australians to be honest but just not the ones I’ve met on these boards.

Posted from  United Kingdom

I understand Australia’s frustration but the Italian fans are not boasting about the win we are just trying to defend ourselves against accusations that we are all cheaters and divers. Once again, and get it through your thick skulls, THE REF CALLED THE PENALTY NOT US. Your beef is with FIFA not Italian Football. The Italian Football Federation has been after FIFA for years about this sort of thing but nobody seemed to care in the past, well now everybody seems to care all of a sudden because the Italians got a break. Well fine, if that’s how it has to happen than that’s how it has to happen. Maybe next time we are penalised in such a manner you will understand the other side of the matter and the point we have been trying to make for years. Sepp Blatter should be removed as President once and for all and not to mention all the Brazilian influence in FIFA’s governing body. You want to know something, Germany and Brazil are the most heavily protected teams in the world. So don’t worry Australia, you can wave your anti-Italian flags very soon because it will be a Germany-Brazil final. Mark my words.

Posted from  Canada

Zico what do we have to do to make these aussies understand?

Posted from  United Kingdom

Absolutely nothing Sunny, they will never understand until the same luck should befall them and they are persecuted. Nobody can possibly understand what Azzuri fans have to go through. Our team is not perfect, our players are not perfect and sometimes we get a little luck on our side but most of the time it seems we are very unlucky. I AM NOT ASHAMED OF THIS WIN. I am both relieved and proud of the way our team played despite accusations of dives and cheating. That’s what pride is folks, when all the chips are down and everyone is hurling insults at you, you can still be proud of what you are and not bury your head in the sand like some ostrich. I feel we have been redeemed for FIFA’s actions against us in 2002 and perhaps that is why this happened. Australia: Just a word to the wise, don’t be quick to judge the actions of other nations unless you are willing to be judged yourself. You are basically new in this competition, you haven’t even begun to see the corruption yet. Open your eyes and use your common sense. What does it tell you. This tournament is controlled by the almighty dollar, everything else is trivial in the eyes of FIFA. They don’t care about bad officiating or teams who feel they have been cheated or any of this crap. If they did they would have corrected this problem a long time ago. You can protest until your face turns as blue as your flag but it’s all futile because it will fall on deaf ears. We know this fact all too well. So I apologize but unfortunately you are just one in a long line of countries that have been screwed by FIFA one way or another. The world cup is about the best possible outcome. What matches will create the best TV ratings. I said it once, I’ll say it again. Germay-Brazil final -> BIG, BIG ratings. It’s a grim reality that we all must face, nothing is as it seems. God Bless all of you. Good Night.

Posted from  Canada

Zico, Remember Italia 90 pks against the argies. I still remember Baggio kicking that pk over the bar in usa 94, remember the pk’s against france in 98, remember the final seconds of euro 2000, remember korea 2002 against Croatia and Korea. Now how can anyone say we are cheaters and that we cheat our way through? We have had the worst luck ever since 82.

Posted from  United Kingdom

Sunnyyyyyyy what are you trying to do? Do not mention all those pks it’s something should be erased from human history.It’s a crime against my italianhood (italianity, italianitiness….that).

Posted from  Italy

You are absolutely right Sunny. I don’t see one bit of luck or any sort of advantage given to us in any of those tournaments and one of them was on home soil for God’s sake! I wish that this penalty had been awarded to us against a team like Germany or Brazil because that would have been poetic justice. Another thought, everyone seems to think because of our corruption problems back home that we must be bribing FIFA, well if that were true than I think we would have managed to win more than one world title in the past thirty years. At least the Italian authorities are taking a step to clean this game up. Maybe this will raise some awareness that this shit is actually happening in professional sports and it may very well expose the scandals deep within FIFA. I wonder what the Swiss authorities have uncovered??? They should clean house soon but first let’s use our cheating and cajoling to bring home a fourth title, with all the briberies we are paying out it should be a cake walk. For old times sake amici. We owe it to our children and our children’s children

Posted from  Canada

First of all, I would like to point out how in the supposed Italian training video, the coaches do not look like Lippi or the assistants and the players do not look like the Italian squad

Secondly Grosso did not dive. He may have had his right foot over the ball but hbis left one was kicked up. It is easy to lose your balance running at those speeds. Trust me as i have played soccer and have seen it happen.

Thirdly, why video refs. It’s like hockey. Video refs cant decide whether something is a foul or offside. They are only there to decide if the puck goes in or not and that is what we have linesmen for. Refs make mistakes and thats what makes games interesting. If refs were perfect, do u think Maradona would get the hand of god goal??

Italian refs cheat. Bah!! Scandals happen everywhere. GERMANY

sorry comment got cut

Scandals happen everywhere Germany, England BRAZIL!! Italy’s is just the only one that is being stopped which shows italian footballs dedication to fair play.

I think Zico is right. Brazil-Germany final. Not because they are the best teams, but because FIFA favours them and so do the refs. It’s historically been like that. VERY UNFORTUNATELY. Brazil would’ve NEVER won the cup in 2002 if Belgium (Belgium got 2 good goals disallowed for no particular reason and Brazil got 2 OFFSIDE goals – reminds me of their game against Ghana this year…) and Turkey (need I remind you of Rivaldo?) hadnt been cheated. Besides, whoever plays Brazil in the end will likely have a at least one of their best players get some sort of a red card right before the final so they cant play in it… (Germany 2002 and Ghana-Essein). I’m starting to think it’s all a gimmick!

But look at statistics, why is it Brazil gets away with everything and no one ever complains. Hoever, there is a slight possiblity of a diving by Grosso (which I KNOW was NOT diving, but a good play) and everyone is talking about it. How about Brazil got 2 offside goals against Ghana? How about Spain’s penaly kick and their diving in the knowckout round? Yet, everyone pinpoints Italy.

What about Beckham? It’s not like he REALLY deserved that free kick?

Well, I wont. In fact, I’m going for Italy. I bought my Italia bracelet, the jersey and shorts and I’m supporting them 100%.

Italy: note that you have a French-Canadian/Amerindian fan!

It’s time Italy reminds the world where soccer comes from any how. I’m sick of this rating BS. If it ends up like in 2002, FIFA will hear from me!

Posted from  Canada

Oh and should I even bother moentioning how Greece won the Euro in 2004??? I mean, how the heck did that happen???

P.S. Dont take this badly, I very much like Greece!

Posted from  Canada

interesting article

http://www.cbc.ca/sports/worldcup2006/features/italy.html

Posted from  Canada

Zico I agree with everything you brought forward. People should know that Grosso was well on his way to scoring the one and only goal of that game and I wished the Aussie would have stayed on his feet so that we could have witnessed it. Maybe that would have been a more desrving victory and put all this whining from those anti-azzuri to rest.The end result would have been the same.

Posted from  Canada

thank you sunday! That is a great article!I am going to send it to all of my friends!

P.S. for all of you coming on this blog to say that grosso dived, go take some lessons in soccer or even just look up the rules onthe FIFA website and go chat with the other countries, cause we are more than sick of hearing from you. This is a soccer blog. Not a blog for fairweather fans who watch 10 games every 4 years. I dont mean to be mean but this is ridiculous and out of hand…

Now to more important things!
Sleep well Azzurri! and I wish you the best for domani!

Posted from  Canada

wow drew! great work! Tell me, do you know who killed Kennedy?

Posted from  Canada

Lovely game, but badly in need of serious reform

FOR fans, it is the greatest show on earth. Yet anyone watching the World Cup must be wondering: how can such exquisite skills by the players coexist with such incompetence by referees supposed to be the best in the world?

It’s not just Australians asking that. All over the world, fans are asking how “the beautiful game” can allow its results to be decided by such random officiating.

The Americans, who had the tough luck to get German dentist Markus Merk as referee for their deciding match against Ghana, are fuming. Never mind that Merk awarded 32 fouls their way as against only 16 to Ghana — matching the record he set a round earlier between Australia and Brazil. What made them mad was that Ghana scored the winning goal from a penalty kick that neutrals agreed was undeserved.

The Koreans too are fuming. In their final match against Switzerland, referee Horacio Elizondo awarded 20 fouls against them as against eight for them, ignored a Swiss handball in the penalty area, and overruled the linesman’s offside call to allow a Swiss goal.

The Tunisians are just as livid. They were eliminated after referee Carlos Amarilla decided Ukraine’s star striker Andriy Shevchenko had been tripped and awarded him a penalty kick, from which he scored the lone goal of the match. The video replay suggested that in fact Shevchenko tripped over his own feet.

I could go on, but you get the picture. Game after game has been decided not by the skills of the two teams, but by refereeing decisions at critical moments.

The beautiful game has a problem. In no sport on earth are more matches decided by the chance fate of refereeing decisions. If the ref sees a critical decision your way, you win. If he sees it the other team’s way, you lose.

Sure, random decisions can decide the outcome in any sport. But in soccer they matter far more often, because it is such a low-scoring game that one goal often decides the result.

And what makes soccer such a low-scoring game is primarily the offside rule. By preventing forwards from playing forward, it limits teams to a handful of scoring opportunities. So forwards become professional actors, divers in search of penalties, and the result of the entire match frequently depends on how the ref judges those critical moments.

On many a winter day standing on the sidelines of a soccer field, heart rising and falling as decisions went one way or the other, I found myself contrasting FIFA, the governing body of world soccer, with the much-maligned AFL.

The AFL might get a lot of smaller decisions wrong, as it did last week, but it has got a lot of the big ones right. It has been willing to innovate, and that has allowed the game to evolve to a higher level.

The AFL was right to replace one umpire with two, and now three. That relieves umpires of the pressure of having to call every decision on the field, and reduced the number of umpiring errors. That also reduced their influence on the outcome, and made for a better game.

It was right to allow players to take time out on the bench, then return to the field. That makes for a higher-quality game, gives coaches more flexibility, and gives spectators a better game to watch.

It was right to impose a salary cap and egalitarian draft rules so that clubs at the bottom can pick themselves up. In the past 20 years, most AFL teams have won a premiership. In UK soccer, by contrast, Manchester United has won eight of the last 14 championships, while in Italy, Juventus has won seven of the last 12.

In soccer, none of these innovations is possible. It may be the world game, but in this area of the world, Europe rules. And that means the balance between tradition and innovation leans heavily towards tradition.

And towards money. For months Italy has been rocked by an unfolding scandal over clubs and referees fixing matches so they could make money by punting on unexpected outcomes. It culminated last week when Juventus, AC Milan, Fiorentina and Lazio were all charged over allegations of match-fixing, illegal betting on results, and manipulation of referee assignments.

It is not that FIFA’s rules never change. One charitable explanation of the refereeing at this World Cup is that it has now sent referees out with a mission to crack down on unsporting tackles, and some teams had not got the message. But go back through video replays of the matches, and that explanation is hard to accept.

What you see on the screen is a different problem: whether consciously or not, the referees are treating the top teams with kid gloves, while dealing harshly with outsiders such as Australia and the African teams.

By the end of the first round last weekend, the eight seeded teams had collected a net surplus of 101 fouls: that is, 101 more fouls awarded in their favour than against them. Italy alone had a net foul count of 26 in its favour, Brazil 19, Spain 18, Argentina 16 and so on. Yet Australia had 30 more fouls called against it than for it, Ghana 36, and Tunisia 26.

The core problem of soccer, however, is not referee bias, but referee overload and rules that make them too often the arbiters of who wins the match. It would help if there were two referees, so fewer decisions are called from way behind the play, and the pressure on refs is eased. It would help if, at top level, a video referee could intervene on decisions involving penalties and goals.

But the beautiful game should go further. Whether by scrapping the offside rule, or enlarging the net, it should allow more goals, so matches depend less on the referees, and more on the way the teams play the game.

Posted from  Australia

Dive, dive, dive.

http://www.footballfansfortruth.us/archives/001515.html

Posted from  United States

I’m just wondering whether i have hitherto translated a Latin proverb wrongly. So far I have translated

DIVIDE ET IMPERA
into
DIVIDE AND RULE.

Maybe it means:

HEY GUYS, LET’S DIVE AND
HAVE THE UMPIRE ON OUR SIDe

Posted from  Germany

Funny how that video shows people who look nothing like the italian team or coaches

Hi Phelpsy,
You wrote
“As for all this crap about being the best at everything – as an earlier poster said- you’re countrymen are not exactly noted as being overly brave or anything – lovers not fighters I think the saying went in WWII”
You do not know anything about WWII only that the winner tells the story and the winner was The USA, you just happened to be on the beside them.
Germany totally defeated the UK, France (2 then superpowers) and spared 1/2 million troops at Dunkerque(let them embark instead of capturing or annihilating them)the big bully saved you all and you claim victory! As for the Italian soldiers they had no shoes or arms, easy to take out! But the Italian cities were liberated by unarmed revolting civilians, not by the allies.

HOW BRAVE ARE WE AUSSIES, SEE CRONULLA, 500 AGAINST 1, VERY BRAVE
The truth is there is good and bad everywhere I am sick and tired of people from all nations always critising others (sport or war) some people aren’t so lucky like you or me. They have no food and here we are ripping into each other over rubbish!

We will never prove we are better then others, deep down we know most people across the world are the same.
Try and beat the Hopi at enduring on foot!

All the best mate!
Gian

Posted from  Australia

FORZA ITALIA

Italy 2 Germany 0

Bring on the final….

So proud to be an italian

Posted from  Australia