Same here.

Well done England.

Wilshire MotM easily. Keeps hold of the ball with ease.

Rated the kid for years. Wasn't sure if he'd come back the same player after such a long time out but seems he is. Best technical English player I've seen in my lifetime.

Is he playing well for Arsenal too? How long has it been since he came back? I remember watching some Arsenal games before his injury and he did look very good.

Yep, have always been a fan of his. One game that immediately comes to mind was his performance in that game against Barca at the Emirites when Arsenal won 2-1.

There are very few English players which I actually like, three of them to be specific; Becks, Lampard and Wilshire

Agreed.

Mattia De Sciglio, Alessio Cerci and Luca Antonelli are in Cesare Prandelli’s Italy squad to face Brazil and Malta.

The Azzurri play Brazil in a friendly in Geneva on Thursday March 21, then travel to Malta for the World Cup qualifier on March 26.

Torino winger Cerci has represented Italy at all youth levels, but never received a senior call and last wore the Azzurri colours in 2009.

He has seemed more mature and reliable with the Granata this season after got his debut call from Prandelli.

Genoa wing-back Antonelli has been in the Italy squad before, but not since 2010.

Milan youth product De Sciglio is promoted from the Under-21 side to senior level, although he is still only 20 years old.

Marco Verratti is not included because the midfielder picked up an injury with PSG.

Lazio goalkeeper Federico Marchetti and Bologna duo Alberto Gilardino and Alessandro Diamanti are also rewarded for recent form.

Roma pair Pablo Daniel Osvaldo and Daniele De Rossi are both suspended against Malta, but can face Brazil.

The Italy squad will get together at the Coverciano training ground on Monday afternoon and present the new team strip for the Confederations Cup.

Goalkeepers: Gianluigi Buffon (Juventus), Morgan De Sanctis (Napoli), Federico Marchetti (Lazio), Salvatore Sirigu (Paris Saint Germain);
Defenders: Ignazio Abate (Milan), Luca Antonelli (Genoa), Davide Astori (Cagliari), Andrea Barzagli (Juventus), Leonardo Bonucci (Juventus), Giorgio Chiellini (Juventus), Mattia De Sciglio (Milan), Christian Maggio (Napoli), Andrea Ranocchia (Inter);
Midfielders: Antonio Candreva (Lazio), Alessio Cerci (Torino), Daniele De Rossi (Roma), Alessandro Diamanti (Bologna), Emanuele Giaccherini (Juventus), Claudio Marchisio (Juventus), Riccardo Montolivo (Milan), Andrea Pirlo (Juventus), Andrea Poli (Sampdoria);
Forwards: Mario Balotelli (Milan), Stephan El Shaarawy (Milan), Alberto Gilardino (Bologna), Sebastian Giovinco (Juventus), Pablo Daniel Osvaldo (Roma)

Cerci and Diamanti really deserve to be there. Some people will probably complain, but your club football is how you earn International call-ups and they've totally earned it.

Rannochia, El Sharrawy and Osvaldo are questionable IMO. The rest looks pretty good.

It's nice to see a strong Rossoneri representation in the Azzurri call-up list

Why no Santon? Is he injured?

Nope. In fact he scored today.

Or maybe Prandelli has better options to choose from

Maggio, DS, Abate

He was called for Italy U21 team that are preparing for the 2013 UEFA U-21 Championship.

I'll never understand Prandelli's fixation with Giaccherini. And AM?

It's a complete travesty.

Though I'm glad Montolivo is getting some rest.

Balotelli almost!

The other day he said Giaccherini was an "extraordinary" player...

And some people want the guy guy at Milan. he's without doubt a good coach, but he's painfully old fashioned and has some bizarre fixations.

He's playing from the start. No Marchisio.

He's better than Allegri.

Osvaldo wearing #10.

Balotelli looks really lively. You don't see that everyday.

Who said Maggio can't defend?

DS > Alves



+1

If he had C. Ronaldo's commitment, he'd easily be one of the top 5 strikers in the world.

Osvaldo and Giaccherini have no business being there. play Insigne and SES instead.

1-0

Better team concedes.

Just turned it on and players can't even run with the ball. Has it been raining hard or something? Ridiculous when players have to play meaningless games like this.

Why can't this extraordinary Giaccherini even control a ball? **** you Prandelli!

2-0

Now this one can be partially be blamed on DS. though someone should've covered his back.


Brazil are not a powerful team at all. I'm surprised they've managed to score 2 goals. if this was Spain instead of Italy, they'd be 2 goals down.

This game is dull. Just Brazil defending then launching forward. Modern football FTL.

+1

If the WC was now, Brazil wouldn't get past the group stage. Very, very poor team.

And Neymar couldn't be overrated more. sure, he was involved in both of Brazil's goals and will become a good player no doubt. but to think some people actually dare to compare him to Messi just makes me giggle. there's more chance of him ending up another Robinho.

BALO! Great goal

BALO

Right now this game is anything but dull, kurt. you're missing out if you're not watching.

Balotelli should have scored another one. JC is having a very good night.

Doesn't he always... I've rarely seen him play badly all these years.

Italy should have scored at least 5 goals. They're literally destroying Brazil.

Diamanti is the most egoistical piece of crap I've ever seen. He only passes the ball when he's taking a corner.

Brazil should be happy with this result.


Very good to brilliant games from our players. Balo was fantastic IMO despite all the missed chances. DS and Monto were great as well. SES failed to make much of an impact but even he was good every time he got the ball.

Italy hasn't beaten Brazil for 31 years now. Their last win? 1982. Today was a good chance to tilt the statistics, this is one of the worst Brazil NT of all time, some very mediocre players in.

Class

Haha, yeah, tell me about it. No Silva, no Pato, only a fleeting Kaka combined with a bunch of doofuses, Italy had as good an opportunity to register a win and the let it squander. Though it must be said Julio Cesar was massive today, it was like watching Samir Handanović in goal. Shades of Inter.

it really is a shame to see brazil at such a low point.. they have always had many players that i loved at one point or another but now i dont really care for the roster. i think with brazil it has always been a situation where the top players cycle coming through was never ending but now it has ended and it will probably take a while to get it going again.

USA - Costa Rica going on right now in a snowstorm. The ref tried to stop the match at 55' and the players on both sides got pissed and convinced theref to change his mind.

from this photo it looked terrible.. maybe it shouldve been stopped?

btw how do they determine where home matches are played for team USA? popularity of the soccer in certain areas or random?

It most definitely should have been stopped, but it was really fun to watch. Not too many players lost footing until the end, by that point there was probably about 6 to 8 cm of snow on the pitch, except for the sidelines and sometimes penalty box that guys with shovels kept trying to keep clean. Free kicks were useless, the players would try to clear out a patch so that they could get some power on the shot, but it never worked. Visibility was poor too.

I'm not sure how they select where to play. More often than not for important games like qualifying they play at places that have larger stadiums (and MLS teams that play in them) like Los Angeles or New York or Washington, D.C., but every once in a while they throw a game into seemingly random locations like Utah or in this case, the Denver area even though it only seated 19,000. To their credit, the stadium was still packed until the end, but people in that area are used to snow so they probably didn't care. It's unusually cold in most of the north here this week (here in Chicago too), we are all getting January-type weather even though it is spring, so I don't think it was planned to try to play in winter conditions.

Seems pretty poor decision making to have a qualifying game in that area at this time of year. Imagine if the US lost or something as a result? I'd have thought they'd have given it to Florida/California or something that wasn't expected to snow!

Costa Rica is filing a protest with FIFA. I don't blame them. The article said that Denver was chosen as the location in order to help prepare the team for playing at high altitude in advance of playing at Mexico City next Tuesday.