With the Juventus vs. Parma game, I almost forgot the little bit of Coppa Italia action we had Wednesday night. Not that the competition is all that exciting to be perfectly honest, but for the sake of being thorough, here goes. You’ll pardon me if I borrow a few words from La Gazzetta dello Sport though.

In the first leg of the first semi-final of the Coppa Italia, Roma beat Catania 1-0, the Giallorossi playing some good, entertaining football, but guilty of missing a lot of chances (something reflected in the measly 1-0 final score line). The goal however, scored by Giallorossi captain Francesco Totti, was certainly worthy of the best: the Roma talisman scored with a stunning right-footed shot from outside the area, just one minute into the second half.

Roma played the rest of the game pretty much in control the whole time, but Catania keeper Ciro Polito was stunning in keeping his goal safe, and giving his side a slim chance for the return leg.

	ROMA-CATANIA 1-0 [Match Highlights]
GOALSCORERS: 46’ Totti (R)
ROMA (4-2-3-1): Curci – Cicinho, Mexès, Panucci, Antunes (83’ Tonetto) – Brighi, Perrotta – M.Esposito (60’ D.Pizarro), Giuly (76’ Vucinic), Mancini – Totti. (bench: Bertagnoli, Juan, De Rossi, Taddei). Coach: Spalletti.
CATANIA (4-3-2-1): Polito – Silvestri, Silvestre, Stovini, Alvarez (82’ Sabato) – Gazzola (46’ Izco), Edusei, Gia.Tedesco – Martinez, Mascara – Spinesi (71’ Morimoto). (bench: Ge.Rossi, Terlizzi, Biagianti, Baiocco). Coach: Zenga.

.

 

In the other semi-final (played later in the evening at the San Siro) Inter and Lazio could not get past a 0-0 draw, which in all honesty turned out to be quite a drab match. Inter manager Roberto Mancini decided to give his usual starters a round of rest, and opted to field a line-up with many changes compared to the Nerazzurri’s previous match. On the other end,  Lazio coach Delio Rossi seemed to give much greater importance to the match, playing his best players with the only notable exception of Rolando Bianchi up front.

In the first half, it was Lazio who enjoyed all the better chances, with Delio Rossi’s men perhaps a little wasteful. After the break Inter were much more dangerous, and half way through the half came very close to opening the score through Nicolas Burdisso (the Argentine defender hit the crossbar. The final scoreline was a fair result for both sides, who will have to do just a little bit better next time, in order to earn their ticket to the final game (the return leg is scheduled for May 7).

..

	LAZIO-INTER 0-0 [Match Highlights]
GOALSCORERS: /
INTER (4-4-2): Toldo – Burdisso, Materazzi, Chivu, Cesar – Figo (39’ Bolzoni), Jiménez (76’ Siligardi), Maniche, Solari (78’ Cambiasso) – Crespo, Suazo (bench: Orlandoni, Rivas, Fatic, M.Filippini). Coach: R.Mancini
LAZIO (4-3-1-2): Ballotta – Zauri, Siviglia, Cribari, Radu – Dabo (81’ Manfredini), Ledesma, Behrami (60’ Mutarelli); Mauri – Pandev (89’ Tare), Rocchi. (bench: Muslera, Rozenhal, De Silvestri, Meghni) Coach: D.Rossi

.

Posted in Catania, Coppa Italia, Inter, Lazio, Roma |

This entry was posted on Friday, April 18th, 2008 at 12:35 am and is filed under Catania, Coppa Italia, Inter, Lazio, Roma. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.