Newsgroup: it.fan.studio-vit
Titolo: To Italia, with apologies [Greg Lalas]

To Italia, with apologies
The Azzurri defied the odds and silenced the doubters
Posted: Wednesday July 12, 2006 12:23PM; Updated: Wednesday July 12, 2006
12:23PM
I was wrong, Italia. Wrong to doubt you, wrong to criticize you, wrong to
think that you were overrated, overscandalized and overmatched.
Scusami, Fabrizio. Scusami Michele. Scusami Franco. And, most important,
scusami Paola, "la mia bella Italiana," who is now thoroughly enjoying
making me eat all my pre-Cup Italy-bashing words. She is particularly fond
of the following passage I wrote: "To be honest ... I think Italy will have
trouble advancing from its group."
Nice going, Nostradamus. Now I owe Paola dinner at Nobu. (I might have to
sell my laptop to pay for it, but what the hell -- cute Italians don't visit
me very often.)
But I'd like to say to the Azzurri one more thing: Grazie. Thank you for
showing us that soccer is not about how much individual talent you possess
(see: Brazil), but about how the players interact. And thank you for giving
us something to remember, something even more unexpected and astounding that
Zizou's headbutt.
Up until the semifinals, this had been, for me, a most bland and
unremarkable World Cup. No real Cinderella team, not very much good soccer,
too many cards, too many dives, and ultimately only one transcendent goal --
Argentine Maxi Rodríguez's volley against Mexico.
FIFA tried to counter the negativity with the glorification of Ghana. It fit
well with the soccer suits' commendable efforts to promote diversity (even
while the referees consistently screwed the African teams). But I was amazed
how many people were "impressed" by the Black Stars in the Brazil match.
They lost 3-nil! What's impressive about a 3-0 loss in the Round of 16? It
isn't even a moral victory, when compared with past Cinderella runs by the
likes of Cameroon and South Korea.
As it turned out, the truly exciting story was the Azzurri. They arrived in
Germany tattooed with more question marks than Puma symbols: Did they really
deserve their seeding during the World Cup draw? Was Francesco Totti
healthy? Were they too inexperienced? Who was going to score the goals? How
would the scandal back home affect their performance?
There was something about this Italian team that rubbed people the wrong way
in the beginning. Angered by the match-fixing scandal, irritated by the fact
that the Italians' ego, external pundits hoped the Italians would collapse
like vultures waiting for the sick gazelle to expire.
And the U.S. match seemed to bring their hopes to fruition. The Azzurri drew
1-1 after enjoying a 10-9 player advantage for most of the second half.
Surely, this was the death knell.
But no, it was more like cardiac resuscitation. The next game, they beat the
Czechs, comfortably, then slipped past Australia in the Round of 16 (I don't
care what anyone says: That was definitely a penalty). And in the quarters,
they strutted to a 3-nil win over Ukraine.
All the ugliness, the kicks when they were down, spurred them on. Their fans
started to believe and they all took strength from everyone else's
negativity, like Dark Side siths or Nietzschean übermen -- growing stronger
from that which did not kill them. Even the apparent suicide attempt of
Gianluca Pessotto, a former teammate to several of the Italian players,
didn't get to them.
They arrived at the semifinals having conceded only one goal. Suddenly,
everyone re-examined them, and what they saw was a thing of beauty: the
quintessential team, a highly tuned machine, a Ferrari, whose parts fit
together perfectly.
The entire team played in Serie A -- the very league was under fire from
magistrates, journalists and FIFA bigwigs -- and they struck a blow for the
value of having national-teamers playing in the same league. They were
familiar with each other -- Gennaro Gattuso and Andrea Pirlo, from the Milan
midfield; Fabio Grosso and Marco Materazzi, new teammates at Inter; Fabio
Cannavaro, Gianluca Zambrotta and Gianluigi Buffon, from Juventus (at least
until Juve is sent down a few divisions later this week).
On defense, their familiarity impressed most. During the final, I literally
gasped in awe of the Italian defense. It wasn't the catenaccio of old, but
something more fluid, refined, selfless. At one point, I started laughing,
like the first time I saw Michelangelo's staircase at San Lorenzo in
Florence, because sometimes laughter is the only possible reaction to
impossible beauty.
The indisputable leader was Cannavaro, the captain. He played as if Jupiter
had possessed his body, particularly after his former Juventus teammate
Pessotto's suicide attempt. He won everything on the ground, everything in
the air. He was a gladiator, the perfect spiritual machine -- cold fusion,
perpetual motion and a heart the size of Mount Etna.
Twenty years from now, when I think back to the '06 World Cup, I will
remember the following image first: Cannavaro, standing at midfield during
the penalties, his arms folded, his face as tight and hard as a statue of
Aeneas. His stoicism held during the first four penalties.
Then, when Grosso's kick won the trophy, Cannavaro exploded, with joy, with
relief, with pride. And with a certain amount of "up yours" to all of us
doubters.
And so, all I can say in the end is: Scusami Italia, e grazie mille.
http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/2006/writers/greg_lalas/07/12/sorry.italy/index.html
u
-- 
http://ualone.blogspot.com/
Uno sgarrafiesto con Ualone 

Era una notte buia? Era tempestosa? Fattostà che il Sun, 16 Jul 2006
15:42:43 +0200, "Ualone" <car...@van.basten> scrisse:

Vi perdoniamo tutti, ricchiò. :*
--
Se ti comporti da demente, ti si tratta da demente. Anche perché, altrimenti, non
hai mai la possibilità di capire che ci sei, demente.

 Vi perdoniamo tutti, ricchiò. :*
Ahahahahhahahahaha!
