Injuries have forced Marcello Lippi to add new faces to his squad sooner than intended, reports Paddy Agnew
THE TIMES they are a changing. And so are the world champions. When Italy take to the field tonight in Sofia for their difficult World Cup qualifier with Bulgaria, the side will feature, at most, five of the 14 who played against France in the World Cup final in Berlin in July two years ago.
In many senses, even if this is Italy's third qualifier under their recalled World Cup-winning coach Marcello Lippi, the new-look Italy begins to take shape tonight. When Lippi was hastily appointed to take over from Roberto Donadoni just days after Italy's quarter-final elimination by the ultimate winners, Spain, from this summer's Euro championships, many of us questioned the wisdom of such a quick return to the scene of his greatest triumph.
What has he got to prove? That he and Italy can do it again?
Even if Lippi pronounced himself delighted to be back in charge last July, there was more than a hint of suspicion that after two years of inactivity he had jumped at the job for the want of a better offer.
Talking to Lippi in his native Viareggio 18 months ago, I got the impression he was ready for a new challenge. He had taken a well deserved "time out" after Germany but was beginning to get itchy. It was clear, though, he was waiting for an "important" club - Chelsea in the Premier League, Real Madrid in La Liga or maybe AC Milan or Juventus in Serie A.
Instead, even if his mobile kept ringing as he took his bicycle rides up and down the Viale Regina Margherita, Viareggio's celebrated Liberty promenade, no important offers arrived. Sure, he got inquiries from Turkey and from the Middle East, and he was even offered the job of national coach to Libya but . . . when you have just won the World Cup, Libya, with all due respect, hardly seems the next logical posting.
Back in the Italian saddle, Lippi gave an immediate indication of his intentions when saying he would "take up with the team I left", adding that the 2006 squad still had many good players with plenty to give to the Italian cause.
Three months later, things look different. Only eight of the 23 who featured in Germany are in the squad summoned for the qualifiers, against Bulgaria tonight and against Montenegro in Lecce on Wednesday.
To some extent, injuries have forced Lippi's hand. Goalkeeper Gigi Buffon, defenders Fabio Grosso and Marco Materazzi, midfielders Andrea Pirlo and Mauro Camoranesi and striker Vincenzo Iaquinta, all World Cup winners, have been ruled out of tonight's game by injury.
Yet, talking to reporters at the Italian Federation training centre in Coverciano, Florence, this week, Lippi was the first to admit he would have been making changes, anyway: "You could say that the number of injuries just accelerated a process that I already had in mind . . . I don't want to throw away anyone because the World Cup squad of two years ago featured players who are still very good today. Yet, I know only too well that two years further down the road, age will matter a great deal and for that reason it will be very useful if we introduce seven or eight new players. However, I had hoped to do it a bit more gradually . . ."
Indeed, not only will Italy be without the five World Cup winners mentioned above but at least two other players, defender Nicola Legrottaglie and midfielder Angelo Palombo, have also been ruled out by injury.
No less than seven of the 14 players who featured in Italy's 2-0 home win against Georgia are unavailable tonight.
ITALY MAY have won their opening two games last month, away to Cyprus (1-2) and home to Georgia (2-0), but Lippi knows only too well his side had all the luck going against Cyprus (Di Natale's winner came against the run of play and in injury time) and were poor for much of the Georgia game. Thus, even in these times of injury "crisis", he had no problems leaving out big-name players such as Alessandro Del Piero, 34 next month, and Antonio Cassano, still only 26 but perhaps suspect as to temperament, from the Lippi viewpoint.
Instead, the Italian coach has called up four new boys: the 21-year-old Villarreal striker Giuseppe Rossi, the 22-year-old Napoli defender Fabiano Santacroce, the 21-year-old Napoli midfielder Christiano Maggio and the 26-year-old Udinese striker Simone Pepe.
Of the four, Rossi and Santacroce look like the most serious candidates for South Africa. Rossi, who spent two seasons with Manchester United between 2004 and 2006, during which time he made only a handful of first-team appearances, has long been considered one of the most promising players in Italian football.
"He is ready to play for Italy," said Lippi this week. "He is fast, he is clever, he is complete in that he can play up front alongside a central striker or out on the flanks."
A World Cup qualifier in Sofia is hardly the ideal place for a first full cap so Rossi may have to wait until the Montenegro game next Wednesday, but his current Spanish form would suggest he is worth waiting for.
If and when he does come into the team, Rossi will probably be asked to play wide on the right alongside the central striker Gilardino (or Luca Toni) and Antonio Di Natale. In the meantime, Lippi may be tempted to try the in-form Pepe out wide on the right against Bulgaria.
Given Italian society seems to be experiencing a bout of racism, with black men involved in violent attacks in Milan, Parma and Rome in recent times, there were those who wanted to read a "political" message into the fact Lippi had summoned Napoli's black defender (of Brazilian origins) Santacroce for the first time. Lippi, however, had an entirely typical, football-related explanation for the Santacroce call-up.
"If you want to read it that way, help yourselves," he said. "I hate racism and it's true that Italy has become more intolerant than it once was but I have to say that I had other reasons for picking him. I really like his physical strength, his pace and his ability to anticipate the striker and the fact that he can play at either right back or in the centre of defence."
As for the fourth new boy - Christiano Maggio, like Pepe in excellent form in Serie A at the moment - he seems destined to start both these games on the substitutes' bench.
Even if Lippi's Italy will rely on some tried and trusted dudes like captain Fabio Cannavaro in defence, battlers Gennaro Gattuso and Daniele De Rossi in midfield and Alberto Gilardino in attack, we can still expect to see some fresh faces over the next few days. New boys Rossi, Santacroce and goalkeeper Marco Amelia, along with such as Alberto Aquilani in midfield and Giorgio Chiellini and Liverpool's Andrea Dossena in defence, are all players around whom Lippi may want to build his side for South Africa.
Certainly, these two games will, per forza, afford a chance to experiment.
By the way, how does he view Bulgaria and Montenegro? "They both deserve plenty of respect but we're not worried." He said it.
