Tuesday 19 June 2012

Italy sails into last eight thumping Ireland 2-0

A 35th minute strike by AC Milan forward Cassano, and late 90th minute strike by Balotelli ensured Italy a 2-0 victory against Ireland Republic and confirmed their place in the quarter finals alongside Spain.

Cesare Prandelli's men ruled the first half as they came close to scoring on numerous occasions. Azzurrian, Di Natale was unlucky as he missed out the net three times, with close attempts. 

It was just again and again throughout first half that Italy almost made a breakthrough, but it was only in the 35th minute, when they broke the dead lock with a header from Cassano off Andrea Pirlo's corner.

Prandelli said "We struggled in the first 20 minutes because they decided to try and press us and we couldn't actually squeeze the play in midfield. There was also tension in our play. Perhaps we weren't expecting them to press so much but once we got organized, we played some very good football" Italy almost doubled the score just 4 minutes after the start of the final half, as Balzaretti again showed impressive skill down the left, to cut a pass back into the danger area, but Cassano failed to finish it into the net.

Ireland substituted Shane Long in the 65th minute to increase their tempo of play and a succession of corners followed that left the Azzurri shaky for the first time.

Again in the 79th minute Damien Duff fired in an excellent free kick, beating the defenders, but it ended up straight into Buffon's safe pair hand.

However, it was again a substitute, Balotelli, who scored in the 90th minute with an awesome volley to seal the match for the Italy.

Meanwhile, Ireland coach Giovanni Trapattoni seemed quite optimistic as he said, "I think this evening we played much better than against Spain and Croatia. We played with more personality. Again the goals were soft, coming from two corners, but I am proud of our commitment. Italy beat us but we upheld our honor."

So, it is now Italy to join Spain as runners up of Group C to qualify to the next round and will face the winners of Group D. 

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