Semi-finals: Italy - Spain

[Alex de Large]

I will never forget what Mancini did to Bastoni.

 

[wera]

Why change something if it works?

 

[brehme1989]

Why change something if it works?

He did change something and it almost didn't work.
Should have been Bastoni over Toloi. Di Lorenzo became a cone as a left back when he was bery energetic on the right and Toloi was a ticking bomb.

 

[Bluenine]

I might be being harsh, but I thought pessina was totally worthless last night. Don't know how he is above Locatelli in the pecking order

Pessina is a more attacking option, plays further up the pitch than Locatelli. Pessina did not have a good game, but neither did Barella. That doesn't mean Pessina isn't a quality midfielder, we know his quality in Serie A. The way I see it, Locatelli is a good back up for Verratti in a deeper mezzala role, while Pessina is a good back up for Barella in a more advanced mezzala role. This system worked very well before, coz on the left Italy had a more attacking FB (Spinazzola) so a deeper midfielder (Verratti) made sense.

Italy lost the midfield battle to Spain. Badly. Barella had a stinker, Verratti & Jorginho could not impose their game at all. So Mancini had to change the playbook. I can see the logic of what Mancini was trying to do - he went for an attacking change (Pessina for Verratti) to try and score another goal while also getting a more defensive FB (Di Lorenzo) to compensate in defence. It was a wrong call - it made things worse, and Italy's midfield became worse. Ideally Locatelli should have come on for Barella to have more deeper midfielders on either side closer to Jorginho to try and get some midfield control and play triangles. Mancini unfortunately did the opposite.

But Mancini has also made some fantastic calls in this competition, he is bound to get it wrong every now and then. He did well with the next 3 subs IMO, as Italy played for the penalties. I wish Italy had better options at fullback and striker roles, that is the biggest worry right now.

 

[Black Knight]

I wish Italy had better options at fullback and striker roles, that is the biggest worry right now.

Should have called up D'Ambrosio and Darmian

 

[TheNetworkZ]

We like to meme him a lot but Darmian arguably deserved a call-up. He played a lot more than Emerson and was more solid than Di Lorenzo was during the club season. Of course the roles are different but Darmian's ability to play on FB/WB on either side is his strongest trait.

 

[Bluenine]

Was that Blunine?

inter shirt...shortcut hair, was that you?

Lol i thought the same

Not sure who you guys saw, but I was wearing an Inter shirt and had short cut hair.