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No country suffers from greater media scrutiny than Italy, whose league continues to vie with that of the Premiership as the most fashionable in Europe. Dino Zoff may be among the legends of the Italian game, but he is quickly discovering that, as national coach, past achievements mean little when you have the fate of the azzurri in your hands. This season, Italy has beaten Sweden but, far more significantly, has lost to Denmark, Belgium and, most recently, Spain. On paper, Zoff has an embarrassment of star-studded riches at his disposal but seems unable to decide on his best strategy for Euro 2000, having used 12 midfield players in three matches. Against Spain, he made seven changes from the previous match. Yet the legendary goalkeeper remains optimistic. "Our objective is to reach the semifinals," he said. "I have needed to make changes from match to match in order to look at certain players." Zoff acknowledges, however, that when Italian players pull on a national shirt, they have sometimes been slow to adapt to the differences in officiating. "We have to learn that in international games the referee isn't going to blow for 55 fouls like they do in our domestic football and that means the pace increases dramatically." With Italian clubs having fallen out of the two UEFA competitions this season, there is now an increasing sense of doom. But Zoff denies the national game is in crisis, yet. "They say Italian football is at an advanced stage of decomposition. but we will see at Euro 2000," he said. "That is the right place to judge." No one would dare rule out Italy, given its traditional skill and technical know-how, but there have been reports of rifts in the camp, especially between Juventus strikers Alessandro del Piero and Filippo Inzaghi. While Christian Vieri, the world's most expensive player, badly needs to find his form to fire Italy out of its present malaise if they are to win their first trophy since Zoff himself lifted the World Cup 18 years ago. CNNSI.com's Gabriele Marcotti: Italy suffers from the fact that its media and fans seem to bear a personal grudge against manager Dino Zoff, probably because the azzurri have been so god-awful in recent months. Losing its star goalkeeper (Gigi Buffon) and star centerforward (Christian Vieri) didn't help either, but at least Francesco Toldo is an exceptional replacement between the sticks. The strike force is a mess -- nobody knows who will play -- but there is enough talent and certainly enough motivation (especially from Alex Del Piero) up front to score a few goals. That's all it really needs to do, since the backline of Fabio Cannavaro, Paolo Maldini and Alessandro Nesta is as solid as they come. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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