The Italian call-ups for their upcoming World Cup 2010 Qualifying matches vs. Montenegro (March 28) and Montenegro (April 4) have been revealed. Italy coach Marcello Lippi submitted the list of 23 players to FIFA earlier this week, a list which as usual contains notable absentees and a few surprises.
Continuing to surf on La Gazzetta‘s “Serie A vs. EPL” wave, here are ALL THE PLAYERS from UEFA Champions League’s Arsenal vs. Roma.
As far as neutral spectators go and taking the match in itself, Sunday’s Inter vs. Roma had everything you could wish for in a football encounter: tons of action, goals aplenty, and even a dramatic come-back 10 minutes from time. In the global picture however, even neutrals secretly wished for Roma to take this one.
Indeed, by maintaining their lead over 2nd-ranked Juventus to +7, the Nerazzurri have further decreased the chance for us to see a close race to the finish in May, and once again have sent a very clear message to their Scudetto rivals: “no matter how hard you try, you can’t take us down”.
Roma seem to have taken a fondness for 3-1 wins lately. After Bordeaux and Chelsea, CFR Cluj was the third team Wednesday to fall to the hands of Spalletti’s boys in Europe, enabling the Giallorossi to take sole command of Group A with one match to go.
And indeed that last match against Bordeaux will be determining to seal Roma’s fate: a draw would ensure their mathematical qualification to the next round, but with the first spot of the group on the line, even better would be for them to win.
But speaking of Roma wins, now that is something no man with a sane mind would have bet on just a few weeks ago. Roma were losing match after match in the Serie A, and their 1-0 defeat at Stamford Bridge seemed like the final nail in the Champions League coffin, a campaign which had already started with the shocking 2-1 loss to Cluj on matchday 1 and could only seem to get worse. Or so we thought.
Instead Roma recovered, recuperated their captain Francesco Totti, and they are back. Alive & kickin’! And kicking is what they did today.
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