Match 06 - Netherlands v Italy / Dave Farrar / 08 June 2008 / Leave a comment

If I was as positive about Italy as I am negative about Holland then this would be an easy game to call.

The Dutch come into the tournament with Marco Van Basten seemingly unsure of just what his best team is. If ever you needed a sign of that, it was his decision to replace the injured left winger Ryan Babel with the defender Khalid Bouhlarouz. It seemed an odd thing to do, as if Van Basten wasn't sure about the balance of his squad at this late stage, and it looks even more ill advised now with an injury ruling out Arjen Robben. Van Basten's left sided options are limited, and this weakens what should be the strongest part of the Dutch line-up.

They are shaky at the back, despite what their qualifying statistics suggest. Any team that concedes three goals against Austria really can't be trusted. One of the reasons that they only gave up five goals in qualifying is that Van Basten plays two defensive midfielders, Engelaar and De Zeeuw, to protect his central defenders, but that makes their whole approach unnecessarily negative. At times, Van Basten doesn't really seem to know what he's doing.

So Holland are weak, but the question now is whether Italy can start the tournament strongly enough to exploit them You can often tell how Italy are going to do in a major tournament by the first 20 minutes of the first match. They were poor in both Euro 96 and Euro 2004 and went out at the group stage. In Euro 2000, they started well, and came within 30 seconds of winning the tournament. Roberto Donadoni invests an awful lot of belief in the Bayern Munich striker Luca Toni, and yet I'm still a little suspicious of him. He can be a "flat track bully" at international level, improving his stats against poor defences, and not really doing it when it matters. The last World Cup is a case in point, when his two goals against the Ukraine were the only headline grabbing thing that he did. He's supported by Antonio Di Natale, who is good and occasionally better than that, but is another of those players who may take a while to get used to this kind of tournament play. I'm reasonably confident that Italy will start with a win, and they're just about value at [2.5].

The Dutch are opposable in many ways at Euro 2008, and there are better ways to get against them than this, so keep stakes low, but I'll take Italy to win their opener here.

CORRECT SCORE

The absence of Fabio Cannavaro makes you wonder about Italy defensively, but the fact that both Van Persie and Robben will miss this match more than counteracts that. Also, Van Basten's system doesn't allow both hot-shot strikers, Van Nistelrooy and Huntelaar, to start the game, and there will be less for Barzagli and Materazzi to worry about. The Italians may be vulnerable from a set piece though, it's surprising weakness of theirs, and Van Nistelrooy can always be a threat, so I'm going for Italy to get the win, but only by a scoreline of 2-1.

HALF-TIME

It won't be pretty, it will be tight, and Italy will take a while to feel their way into the tournament, so I don't see it being until the second half before their likely superiority shows. As in so many of these games, it's the draw at half time for me, at [2.04].

FIRST GOALSCORER

Jon Heitinga finished the Dutch domestic season in excellent goalscoring form, nearly firing Ajax into the Champions League before he leaves for Atletico Madrid. He has an excellent record for a central defender, and given the Italian team's occasional weakness from set pieces, he has to be a value call to score. If you're looking for an Italian option, then you could do a lot worse than Marco Materazzi, who scored in the World Cup Final, and does get involved in taking free kicks and threatening from corners.

CORNERS

Holland's style isn't really to get the ball into wide areas, and three of their genuine wide men are out of this game. And, while Italy like their full backs to get forward, they don't have particularly high corner counts. I wouldn't recommend a big bet in this market, but under nine corners here would be the sensible play

Tags: Holland, Italy, Jon Heitinga, Luca Toni, Marco Materazzi