Originally Posted by
egregious
ADP was not a success? He was injured in 1998 WC. He single handedly lead their qualification campaign successfully. In Euro 2000, he and Zidane were the best players of the tournament. But he is being remembered only for those 2 misses and it was not like what Gomez missed in Euro 2008.
In 2006 WC campaign, he changed the game vs Germany. A match regarded as the greatest ever football match in WCs by pundits. The match was even and when he came ON, he changed the course of the game into Italy's favour. It was from his corner that Grosso scored and I don't need to lecture on his superb goal after a few minutes then. In the final, he scored a crucial penalty. Without ADP, Italy would never have passed the group stages in WC 2002.
He played 91 times for Italy scoring 27 goals. Alessandro is NOT a centre forward, he is a supporting striker/trequartista. He captained Italy in Euro 2008 and was the best player in the games against Romania and Spain.
These are just his performances in major tournaments. He was immense for Italy in many qualifiers.
Infact, it's really weird for me to defend the man in terms of his performances for Italy. As a matter of fact, Alessandro Del Piero has got the record of playing in maximum number of major tournaments for Italy
Totti also was NOT a failure for Italy. He was their best player in WC 2002. Though his performances in WC 2006 are over rated, he was still crucial for the Azzurri and he did all those after a serious injury. He wasn't even supposed to be in the team because of that injury.
LOL , LUCA TONI is an ITALIAN STAR? ROFLMAO.
IMO, he is one of the worst strikers ever to play for Italy. No one considers him as a star.