England will be looking to change a less than favourable tradition when they travel to face Italy on Tuesday in Turin. The Three Lions have beaten Italy just twice in their last twelve meetings and lost eight of those matches. Moreover, the last two defeats were during the most recent final tournaments: the World Cup and the European Championships.
Italy are unbeaten in the seven games they have played under new head coach Antonio Conte but that has not protected him from criticism in the Italian media. He also had to deal with several injuries to key players. This time he will be without midfielders Andrea Pirlo and Claudio Marchisio while legendary goalkeeper Gianluigi Buffon is in doubt. Last weekend Italy snatched a 2-1 victory in Bulgaria and Brazilian-born Eder managed to score on his debut.
England have won all their last seven matches and let in just two goals in the process. However, Roy Hodgson will have to do without Raheem Sterling, Danny Welbeck and Leighton Baines on Tuesday. The last visit to Italy was back in 2000 and England were defeated 1-0 with a goal from midfielder Gennaro Gatuso. That was the first game for David Beckham as England captain.
Probable line-ups:
Italy: Sirigu - Chiellini, Ranocchia, Bonucci - Candreva, Parolo, Verratti, Florenzi, Cerci - Pelle, Eder
England: Hart - Walker, Smalling, Jagielka, Bertrand - Carrick, Henderson, Barkley, Townsend, Walcott - Rooney
My prediction: 1-1 draw.
Here are the odds for the match at Bet365:
Italy win - 29/20 Draw - 9/4 England win - 11/5
Shumar4life
9 years ago
Cane showed to us that he will real advantage for England in coming matches, and hopefully he will be one of the main players in coming seasons. He is young, and already he has quality, and he is the player which one England needed for a long time. In pair with Rooney he can be deathly attacker, and I can't wait to see...
Cane showed to us that he will real advantage for England in coming matches, and hopefully he will be one of the main players in coming seasons. He is young, and already he has quality, and he is the player which one England needed for a long time. In pair with Rooney he can be deathly attacker, and I can't wait to see this two players in coming matches
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Johnajax 9 years ago
England is in great form in last few months and I expected here to see much better play by England special if you know that Italy played only 2-2 with Bulgaria (no offense to sharpe but I think that it terrible result for Italy). But Italy defended very well and deserve draw here but that is not important for England they...
England is in great form in last few months and I expected here to see much better play by England special if you know that Italy played only 2-2 with Bulgaria (no offense to sharpe but I think that it terrible result for Italy). But Italy defended very well and deserve draw here but that is not important for England they are first in their qualification group and they have easy job to qualify for Euro 2016.
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sharpe
9 years ago
Really classic European derby. Will be very interesting game I hope and maybe England have a pretty decent chance for a win even though they play away. I was not impressed at all by Italy who had played in Bulgaria last week and they needed a late equalizer but they were outplayed by the Bulgarians.
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seculla
9 years ago
This game will be more than interesting to watch. I'm Italy fan and I watch almost every match they play, either friendly or not. No matter that this game will be friendly and there will not be such "fight" as it should be, but these two national teams are "changing generations". There will be very good players on the pitch...
This game will be more than interesting to watch. I'm Italy fan and I watch almost every match they play, either friendly or not. No matter that this game will be friendly and there will not be such "fight" as it should be, but these two national teams are "changing generations". There will be very good players on the pitch tonight and I expect very exciting match. I suppose that we will see at least three goals.
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