The victory of the bench. Italy beat Austria with a narrow 2-1 and qualified for the quarter-finals in Monaco, where they will face the winner of Belgium-Portugal (at 21 pm), thanks to goals from Chiesa (25 years after that of his father Enrico at Euro 96) and Pessina in extra time. Yes, because 90' weren't enough to decide who, between the Azzurri and the Austrians, should access the next round, forcing both teams to play it all in the next half hour, where, however, luckily, quality came out superior of ours. In short, the adventure continues, with the bar moving to Friday 2 July, when we'll see it with one between Lukaku and CR7, but we will only think about this from tonight, when we know our destiny. In fact, now it's time to comment on what happened yesterday at Wembley, where an apparently easy match turned into a slow agony, which luckily resolved itself positively.
However, the fear was great because Italy, for the first time in this European Championship (and perhaps in the entire Mancini era), found itself back against the wall, with a serious fear of not making it. Thanks to Austria, able to face eye to eye like no one before, but also the fault of the blues, decidedly less brilliant than the other times. The truth therefore lies in the middle and, if you like, gives even more value to the journey of the Azzurri, capable of winning for the first time by suffering, thus showing all of Europe that they not only have good feet, but also a decidedly important character. As well as, of course, a coach capable of reading the game in the best possible way, as demonstrated by the decisive changes in the most difficult moment. “We brought it home because we deserved it – explained Mancini, who since yesterday overtook Pozzo reaching 31 consecutive useful results, the best streak in the Azzurri's history -. In the first half we dominated and could have scored a few goals, then in the second half we dropped physically but we won thanks to the players who came in with the right mentality. Belgium or Portugal? Difficult to choose, they are two great teams, we can only say that our dream is missing 3 games…”.
A nice thought born of a painful victory, because, at a certain point, the Austrian obstacle had become quite big. Italy in fact, after a substantially dominated first half in which only the goal had been missed (sensational post by Immobile and great chances by Barella and Spinazzola), suffered the return of their opponents in a completely different second half, in which Foda's team he took over above all from a nervous point of view, the true Achilles heel of the Mancini gang. Austrian supremacy culminated with Arnautovic's goal which, however, luckily for us, was disallowed due to an offside by a few centimetres (65'), allowing us to take the blow without consequences. If we compared the match to a boxing match we could say that, in the second half, we took a lot of punches, but managed not to fall, and then played our winning cards in extra time, where all our strength came from the bench.
In fact, Mancini's changes were decisive, which removed Berardi, Immobile (both obfuscated) and Barella (booked and at risk of expulsion) to put in Chiesa, Belotti and Pessina, thus giving freshness and character to a team in great difficulty, with head and legs. In the 95th minute, however, Federico scored, very good at controlling a dirty ball from Spinazzola and throwing it into the net behind Bachmann and in the 106th minute, a minute after Insigne's doubling from a free-kick, Pessina made it 2-0 , splendid in punching the Austrian goal with a cross left foot on an assist from Acerbi. Closing like this, however, would have been too easy, as well as unfair, and so in the second extra time Austria recovered, first coming close to making it 2-1 with Schaud, only stopped by a great save from Donnarumma, then found him with a splendid header by Kalajdzic (116'), finally he even risked scoring an equalizer with Gregoritsch, whose shot went off behind the blue goalkeeper.
In short, so much fear and just as much joy, which can only do us good in view of the quarterfinals. The opponent will be of great prestige, there's no doubt about that, but this time the mental factor should be on our side. And even if it weren't, in the light of what happened yesterday, we are sure that we would have the strength to react and play it to the end.
