Euro Mills and Boom: Italy’s tactical dilemma

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Hi everyone, Danny here checking in from Poland. You can hear my thoughts on Euro 2012 every morning on Sky Sports News Radio.

Have a read and leave a Comment below.

Azzurri see off ‘disappointing’ Germany

Italy played very, very well. Andrea Pirlo was exceptional yet again and of course ‘Super Mario’ popped up with a couple of fantastic goals.

Once again, for me, the top teams have disappointed slightly. The Germans weren’t quite at it from the word go and for some reason they didn’t quite get their game going, but Italy got it tactically right again.

They are very good at what they do and they know how to play tournament football. All the shenanigans surrounding the match-fixing scandal has almost galvanised them and it’s amazing what they’ve done.

They’ve shown that you don’t have to have great players, but Balotelli has been exceptional and Pirlo has played very, very well.

Super Mario showing his class

When I speak to the coaches at Manchester City every single one of them will say that Mario is a fantastic, incredible talent and that they haven’t seen a player that can do the things he does too often in their careers – and that is David Platt and Brian Kidd talking, two experienced coaches.

He’s controlled the mental side of his game pretty well, he’s kept his head and has worked very, very hard and he has lived up to the tag of ‘Super Mario’.

You have to remember that he is only 21 and he’s had an awful lot thrown at him. Changing countries, big money moves – it’s a lot to deal with for a youngster.

Too close to call

I think the final is going to be really interesting. Do Italy change their formation and their style slightly from when the two met in the opening game, when they went three at the back and flooded the midfield to try and dominate the Spanish? Since then they’ve gone on and had some fantastic performances playing with a more basic 4-4-2.

I think it’s a difficult scenario for Cesare Prandelli. Does he have the faith in the team that has got them here or does he revert to how they played in that first game? It’s one of those dilemmas, he almost can’t win either way because whatever he does, if it goes wrong, then people will say you should have done the other, so that’s difficult for him.

I’ve been a little bit disappointed with Spain. They haven’t really got going as such and they struggled with the physicality of Portugal.

This is probably the biggest game for both teams in a long time. Spain will be wanting to create history and Italy, who have never really been overly bothered about the Euros, against all the odds, suddenly have a fantastic chance of winning it.