England beats Italy 2-1 in international friendly in Berne, Switzerland.
In essence, this was a friendly that no one was looking forward to. A seemingly inexperienced England squad against a rough-tackling, calciopoli-oriented Italian squad could only lead to one thing: injuries.
And yet, England’s 2-1 victory over a similarly youthful Italian side felt like a step in the right direction, a glimmer of hope after a disappointing Euro 2012 campaign, where manager Roy Hodgson was still at the helm.
Tom Cleverley, Ryan Bertrand, Jake Livermore, and two goalkeepers, Jack Butland and John Ruddy, offered promising debuts to the squad.
However, it was Jermain Defoe’s thunderous late strike that was the highlight of the match. It also served as a reminder of what the Tottenham striker can contribute at the international level, while Michael Carrick put in a solid performance in midfield after being in the dark from the international scene for nearly two years.
After Hodgson had been accused by critics of using an antiquated yet typical 4-4-2 formation for his England squad at Euro 2012, he switched to a 4-2-3-1 formation and soon found that it was exactly what gave England it’s fluidity on the pitch.
Even the fans found that England played considerably better against Italy this time round, unlike in their previous meeting at the Euro 2012 quarterfinals in June. England dominated in possession and eventually came out winners in a toughly contested game.
Daniele De Rossi scored off a header to give the Italians the lead in the 15th minute. However, defender Phil Jagielka scored off a corner to level the game 12 minutes later. Then, in the 79th minute, Defoe scored a thunderous strike in to the top right corner after dribbling in the left side of the Italian box. All this, to give an accurate picture of how the English squad can improve given a right formation change.
The picture will start to become clearer when England take on Moldova and Ukraine in their first World Cup qualifiers next month.
At Euro 2012, England displayed a graft and obduracy that was just enough to match the paltry pre-tournament expectations. But against Italy on Wednesday there were signs of progress that might just make the country grow to like its football team again.
