No magic words as Italy find peace of mind

Marcello Lippi brushed aside suggestions that he had conjured up Italy’s spellbinding second half performance against the United States in their 3-1 win with a “magical” half-time talk.

Rather he said his world champions had found “peace of mind” having gone into the break trailing by Landon Donovan’s 41st minute penalty which followed teammate Ricardo Clark’s controversial sending off.

Seconds after being introduced as a 57th minute substitute Giuseppe Rossi levelled with Daniele De Rossi putting the Azzurri in front only for his New York-born colleague to get a second deep in injury time.

Lippi revealed: “There were no magic words at half-time. In the locker room you say things that you think need saying at certain times. You can get angry with the players if they”re not concentrated enough, but that wasn’t Italy’s case.

“We found our peace of mind in the second half – ‘ooomph’ is not enough, you have to have peace of mind.”

Italy’s numerical advantage certainly helped, Lippi admitted, but it was by no means the deciding factor.

“Remember in Germany (at the 2006 World Cup) the teams were down to ten men each and then 10-9 for us and we still didn’t win that game.

“Just because we were in the majority here it wasn’t easy as the US are a very strong team, their number five (Oguchi Onyewu) was intercepting all our high balls.

“But then Rossi came on and scored after one minute and we went on to win, but don’t think it was easy.”

Asked how pleased he was to have American-born Rossi, who could have played for the States, wearing an Italy shirt he smiled: “Very!”

For US coach Bob Bradley though Rossi’s contribution was hard to take.

“I’ve known the Rossi family a long time, Giuseppe’s dad coached high school soccer in New Jersey. I certainly hoped that he would have played for us but he made his decision.

“He’s a very talented young player, it’s an exciting day for him and obviously a very disappointing day for us.”

Italy can seal their place in the semi-finals with victory over Egypt in Johannesburg on Thursday but Lippi is wary of the Pharoahs after the African Nations Cup champions’ pushed Brazil all the way in Monday’s 4-3 loss.

“Egypt have won two African titles, I know the team well.

“I really like their coach, I like his way of managing his team – it’s going to be tough judged by how they played against Brazil.”

The States are next up against Brazil with Michael Bradley, the coach’s son, saying: “We have no choice but to get over this game. It’s over now. We need to get our focus back and put our minds to beating Brazil.”