Who will win between Belgium and Italy? “We are players who can make the difference”.
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Do you agree or have they missed the mark? As such, Thiago Motta will have a big role to play.
The 47-year-old says that it is the “team that counts” and not one player should be thinking about his individual performance as they are looking to emerge through to the knockout stage. Yet their injury-hit defence is a concern. The winger does not appear natural captaincy material, he clashed frequently with Jose Mourinho at Chelsea and at every Belgium press conference he is asked whether he gets on with Kevin de Bruyne. Wilmots was guilty of being overly cautious at the World Cup two years ago and sadly it seems that he is doing the same this time.
I fancy Belgium to win this match and to establish a solid platform from which they will go on to top Group E as a effect.
LIKELY BELGIUM XI: Courtois; Ciman, Alderweireld, Vertonghen, J. Lukaku; Hazard, Nainggolan, Witsel, De Bruyne. Not only will he be relying of the core of the Juventus side he took to back-to-back Serie A titles, he refused the option to train at the stadium in case his tactics were spied on by Wilmots’ backroom staff. Instead, all Italy’s preparations were done behind the closed doors of their training base at Montpellier.
ITALY PLAYER TO FEAR: Simone Zaza. I can only really talk about our public.
This is Italy’s toughest match.
Belgium, being the hipsters” favourites, will go into this game with the weight of expectations of the whole nation on them as the so called “golden generation’ with an enviable roster of talent pretty much in all the positions.
This time around, Belgium will no doubt win more possession against a depleted Italian side that is without injured midfielders Marco Verrati and Claudio Marchisio and the aging Andrea Pirlo, who is not in the squad.
Goalkeeper Gianluigi Buffon is untouchable, along with defenders Giorgio Chiellini and Leonardo Bonucci.
Hazard, who wears the Number 10 shirt for Chelsea, is valued for his creativity and speed with the ball, which he controls equally well with his left and right foot.
“It wasn’t an injury, he just felt a bit tight in his calf, having played first 60 and then 90 minutes”, Wilmots said, referring to Vermaelen’s involvement in Belgium’s pre-tournament friendlies.
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Belgium’s Eden Hazard attends a training session at the Grand Stade in Decines-Charpieu, near Lyon, France, Sunday, June 12, 2016. Italy are the most prestigious and most hard opponents to start a tournament with, and we’ll need to be in top form right from the start.
