whew, that was a close one

The genius of Karel Brückner is slowly revealed…

After unveiling the Austrian attack and the new goal scoring threat, Emanuel Pogatetz driving home the first goal of the match, his master strategy became clear. With the Campioni del mondo, now fretting over the new super-power Austria taking a two goal lead, they “kept” the game close with it ending in a 2-2 draw, which is likely a good thing, lest we lose the surprise factor of being the 103rd ranked team in the world.

So lets see if anyone can take a joke. Ahh…it was a very solid friendly but seriously how many “friendlies” don’t end up in a convenient draw. I’m not a big advocate of them, they really are a vestige of the past with modern ticket prices. Most top-flight teams put little into them and lessor squads use them as a rallying cry. And while the Austrian press is likely going to line the streets for a parade, it was a friendly and in Nice. Yes, I have a dry sense of humour – a Nice friendly.

On a serious side, if I may, the match featured both Juventus ‘keepers, the genius of Gigi Buffon for Italy and his understudy Alexander Manninger. Alexander was tested on numerous occasions and looked very sharp or Italy would have scored early. The general Austrian discipline in play was solid although I’m hopeful we’ll see more than a 4-5-1 which seems to work against many of the solid developments in the attack-oriented junior / under program. However it appears that Karel Brückner is experimenting with the striker position as he had Marc Janko as the lone striker for most of the match, substituted late with Stefan Maierhofer and left Erwin Hoffer off the opening grid, as expected. While this is only one match, this would leave you to believe that we’ll see a much tighter defensive structure against France. As always Mad Dog is the fire of this squad and he seems to be coming into his own as it relates to leadership.

World Cup qualifying starts in less than three weeks against France.

ITALY-AUSTRIA 2-2
ITALIA (4-3-3): Buffon; Zambrotta (25′ st Cassetti), Bonera, Barzagli (1′ st Legrottaglie), Grosso (1′ st Dossena); De Rossi, Pirlo (1′ st Aquilani), Gattuso (46′ pt Perrotta); Di Natale, Gilardino, Del Piero (29′ st Palombo). A disp. Amelia, Iaquinta.

AUSTRIA (4-5-1): Manninger (1′ st Ozcan); Garics, Stranzl (1′ st Gercaliu), Prodl, Pogatetz (14′ st Leitgeb); Harnik (27′ st Ibertsberger), Scharner, Ivanschitz (41′ st Linz), Saumel, Fuchs; Janko (20′ st Maierhofer). A disp. Standfest, Kienast, Hoffer. Ct Bruckner

Goal: 15′ pt Pogatetz (A), 38′ pt Janko (A), 46′ pt Gilardino (I), 21′ st Ozcan – o.g. (A)