CAPE TOWN – After a weekend of international rugby in a city known for that sport, soccer’s grandest opera returns to the World Cup stage here on Monday. Judging by Sunday’s final run-through, Marcello Lippi is in fine voice.
“If you don’t understand the kind of lineup I’m using, you better change jobs,” the Italy coach told the travelling press pack (and sounding just like one of many emails that arrive daily in the inbox).
So Lippi is ready. But is his team? In a weak Group F, the Azzurri should have no trouble advancing, starting their World Cup title defence against Paraguay at a Green Point Stadium that was christened in last Friday’s other opener, Uruguay and France staggering around to a 0-0 draw. It’s afterward that is the question, and already the flags of the tournament’s highest-rated contenders are being planted — some waving, some not.
Germany, off Sunday’s destruction of Australia, is flying. Lionel Messi — er, Argentina — is right behind, this tournament’s most dangerous force just needing to adjust his sights ever so slightly. France is drooping. England drops, and the jokes go viral. (Did you hear the one about them changing the national anthem? It’s now “God Save the Green.”)
Now comes Italy, a side that proved in 2006 that hype can actually help, winning the World Cup in Germany under Lippi while the calciopoli scandal was reaching inside their camp as it peaked back home.
Four years ago in Duisburg, when that bad-news story was hitting hardest and Alessandro Del Piero was leaving Casa Azzurri for a few hours to a troubled Juventus HQ, the rest of the Azzurri simply went about their business of blunting other teams’ best weapons. Questions about the scandolo were batted right back with considerable brio.
“What did you say? I can’t hear you. Did you say parasites? Did you say all Italians are parasites?” Ace defender Alessandro Nesta sarcastically asked when the subject came up.
The encore is always a difficult act for defending champions, and this environment couldn’t be more different. While Jo’burg rocked in Friday’s smashing opening day, this city rolled with one big party. Saturday it was the Springboks against France. Bringing the champs in for the encore, and on Sunday night they were already readying the downtown and the fan sites that were jammed last time around for this city’s Match Day 2.
While the madness hits, the pregame news for Italy has been as mundane as the form they’ve shown in two final friendlies against Mexico and Switzerland that answered none of the questions. There’s no scandal this time, just the usual round of intense debate about team selection, an injury to top midfielder Andrea Pirlo that will keep him out of at least Monday’s game, and frets about an aging squad universally acknowledged to be short on firepower.
“There’s a great will to do well in this tournament,” Lippi said. “The skepticism I respect, but I don’t agree with it because it comes from just two friendlies. It’s part of a program that we knew would lead us here. They weren’t crucial.”
What might be crucial is a defensive rock who this year at Juventus appeared to be crumbling in front of our eyes. Fabio Cannavaro made it official a few weeks back when he signed to play in Dubai, one of the preferred halfway houses to retirement for idols planning one last grab at the cash. At 36, he’s certainly entitled, maybe the best of a line of superb central defenders that goes back through familiar World Cup names like Nesta, Paolo Maldini and Franco Baresi. And maybe he can summon up one last tournament for the ages, letting 25-year-old Giorgio Chiellini take over the real sweaty work.
That’s the optimistic take, anyway. And no matter how loudly Lippi sings that one, we all still have no idea who’s going to finish it up at the other end of the field.
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