First round of group games: Spain v. Italy

As the beginning of the European Championships approached opening day, the defending champs’ first fixture became a more and more enticing prospect.

Italy has lost on penalties to Spain in Euro 2008, embarrassed themselves with a group stage exit in World Cup 2010, and retired most of the players that had contributed to their success in the 2006 World Cup.  During that time Serie A has seen itself devastated from a match fixing scandal, seen those club teams that were found guilty return to power, had an offensive minded rebirth thanks to new coach Cesare Prandelli, and are now in the midst of yet another match fixing scandal which Prandelli suggested may justify their possible withdrawal from the tournament.

In short, no one was really sure which Italy was going to show up, and after their opening tie with Spain they are still the team that everyone is going to be unsure about, even as there were a lot of twists and turns after the first 8 games of the tournament.

A surprising 3-5-2 formation left De Rossi playing alongside Chiellini and Bonucci more often than Pirlo and Thiago Motta.  A position he played with poise and grace as he distributed the ball better than most center backs will.  Chiellini showed why some rate him as the first or second best center back in the world by closing down anyone that came near him and laughing off any cross that the much shorter Spaniards would dare to float in.  And Andrea Pirlo…well there’s a reason that Juventus went undefeated this year.

They're good, but seriously short.

Spain as well brought in a surprising formation as the absence of David Villa and the unconvincing Fernando Torres left Vincent Del Bosque with a big question mark at the top of his team sheet.  So he decided not to fill it.  Spain played a 4-3-3 with no recognized striker and no out and out wingers, effectively a 4-6-0.  And while Spain are good at the short game, it became incredibly predictable.  There was no point man to lead a break, no wide men to stretch the defense and create holes, and at times you could see all 6 of their midfielders within the same 20 by 20 box defended by 2 Italians, like a practice exercise.  It left them with half chances that a talented and organized Italian defense could turn away, and long shots that won’t bother a keeper like Buffon.  They did get through and score with a clever side-footed pass from Silva to Fabregas, these guys are the best passers in the world, but there weren’t that many out and out chances.

Bringing on Jesús Navas and Fernando Torres did lighten their game up as you could find Navas on the right wing literally waving his arms as he was so open due to Italy’s 3-5-2 formation.  And Torres, well his finishing has been awful for the last 18 months, but his runs were well timed and he gave that Azzurri defense more than one scare.

They say that every great team has a shelf life of about 3 years, and Spain’s run has been pretty incredible:  Euro 2008, World Cup 2010, Barcelona winning the Champions league in 2009 and 2011, Real Madrid always threatening.  But at some point their successful brand of football will eventually fade like the Dutch in the 70’s and the Italians of the 80/90’s.

My hope is for tiki-taka to go a different route.  Like an actor, say Jack Nicholson or Christopher Walken, who is so successful and so unique that they stop performing as characters in films and just show up as caricatures of themselves; Spain’s midfield strength is so great that if they continue to rely on it at the expense of width and defense, their tactics could metaphorically start eating themselves.  They’ve already started with their forwards.

But I could be wrong, they’ll probably beat Ireland by 4-5 goals.