I see all you attacking Del Piero for his missed chances.I guess you are all forgetting very easily.Ok,be angry with him especially if you are an Italian fan,but it's rediculous to say that he is overestimated,that he has no talent or that he shoudn't play for Italy.Alex have give funs some of the most exciting football moments over the last years.I think is by far the best Italian player at this time.He alone is better than Henry,Wiltord,Trezeguet and Dugarry together.His injury was crucial for his performance and I know that.He only playes 40% of his real ability,but he still shows his class.So criticise him if you want but please don't underestimate him so much.
But even if you people say bad things about him,deep inside,you all wish you were a little like him...

Forza ITALIA
DEL PIERO FOREVER!!!

Nick...

Is that useless f*cker really the highest-paid player in the world?

He must be the highest-paid clown or comedian, he's so foolish in front of goal, does he know how to put the ball in the back of the net?

I guess not http://www.soccergaming.com/ubb/smile.gif

Problem is that players with potential must also have work ethic and ability to do it under pressure.

Any Juve fans remember Juan Esnider?? What suprises me is that Juve had no patience with Henry, Vieri, and many other strikers. Yet they still hang onto hope that Del Piero's best days have yet to come.

Imagine if Juve got rid of Inzaghi and DelPiero and bought say a Nesta and a left winger -giggs or overmars or even denilson.

Kept Vieri and Henry!!

Damn someone at juve knows his center midfielders but is blind up front.

70000 pounds a week to score penalties?? I'll do them for free.

Henry sucked with Juve and he did get his chances .I dont respect Del Piero no more ,he is way overrated ,how the **** is that the highest player in the world has so much trouble scoring ?As for Vieri ,Juve just signed his younger brother and lets hope he becomes like his brother .

Henry sucked for Juve, but Del Piero was certainly no star. 1 goal - 2 years enough said. Why can't they just be consistent is all im saying.

If your giving Del Piero 10 years to mature least you can do is give Henry more than 1 same with Vieri.

Vieri left Juve cause he wanted a lot of money ,but now that we have Trezeguet(coincidently he scored against us) ,they should get rid of Del Piero .

oh yeah, Henry sucked for Juve, umm, you could say the same thing about Kovacevic, Henry didn't suck, he really never had a real chance, i wateched some guys here in the u.s. (rai showed a game every sunday, dont know why they dont do it anymore) and henry never started. if kovacevic went to another club with a better coach, he would deffinitely be one of the best in europe, just like henry is now

Henry's rise to stardom has been in no small part to Arsene Wenger at Arsenal - if you saw Henry at the beggining of the season at Arsenal he was useless (I laughed at some of my Gooner friends); it was obvious he was not used to playing as an out and out striker. But as the season went on Wenger stuck with him, and he exploded with 26 goals in the last half. He's a far cry from the player that used to play for Juve.

Thats true Emerson, it seems every time he came of the bench this season he scored. Its funny how him a rarely used sub has more goals then Del Piero this year.

Unless Juve wanna try winning all their games 1 - 0 I suggest they get a little know player who can do just one thing - score goals.

Jardel, Milosevic, Hasselbank - (yeah i know their all taken)

PLEASE DONT SAY JUVE SHOULD USE DEL PIERO IN MIDFIELD AS A PLAYMAKER!!!

They got that guy - whats his name... OH YEAH ZIDANE. How many play makers do they need?

Henry did play a lot and he just scored 2 goals ,both came in one game and he was a regular .Secondly,now that Juve signed Trezeguet ,wich striker will leave from Juve .

Henry played on the wing where he did not prefer. Kind of like playing Zidane as striker and complaning when he doesnt score enough. Problem is I see Tzretgret as a more winger not striker.

I hope the get rid of Del Piero and Inzaghi but stay away from Vieri, he's INTERS!!! :-)

Well juve has Massimiliano Vieri(His younger brother),lets hope he becomes a star .

Sorry J., but your a little off on your criticism of the French strikers.

When Henry went to Juve he was very much accustomed to playing wide left for Monaco. And who was commonly his target in the middle? None other than Juve's new signing Trezeguet. Thus Juve actually accommodated where he and they thought Henry would be effective. Wenger, just this season at Arsenal, trained him to play in the center channel - with fantastic results, both for Arsenal and France. (I think Neutral commented on all of this already.)

Trezeguet was definitely an out and out striker for Monaco. Juve will probably not tinker too much with his position.

Henry, Wiltord, Trezeguet: they are all WAY better than del Piero.

So Henry only scored 2 goals (as a midfielder) in a half-season in Italy. I mean he scored 2 goals!!! What did del Piero do last year?

In fact, what did he do since France 98. HE SHOULD NOT HAVEN BEEN WITH ITALY. THE ONLY BAD DECISION BY ZOFF IN THE LAST MONTH!

He is slow, can dribble (no he can't), can't shoot - all those buggers who call him a star did only follow soccer by the ads in the last 2 years.

People, would you please stop bashing Del Piero???

You have GOT to consider his injury. It kept him out for basically an entire year. It's not easy to go back to the great level he was playing at before he got injured. In fact, he's still not even close...

If you honestly believe that the Del Piero of 2 years ago is the most overrated player ever, then go ahead, think what you want. But you're wrong...

I really hate when injuries have such a great impact on a player's career, it is really a shame. I wonder if Ronaldo will ever be the way he was 2 years ago (certainly hope so...)

Since we are talking about Henry was it me or did it seem that this man was running like crazy for the whole game? He has the stamina of a horse!

And yes I don't think he had a fair chance in Juve he came in at mid-year and hardly ever played, and one game I did see him play on RAI he came on as a sub and scored a great goal!

Someone mentioned Dugarry, to me he was playing some of the best football on the field, and I was shocked he was taken out for a sub. Only reason could be he was running out of gas and he took a bad knock on his broken nose again so I guess that is partial explanation. The BBC panel at half-time even made a point of it that he was the best French player by far on the day, better than Zidane.

Henry did play regularly ,he was replacing Del Piero who was injured for a year .The only time he that he didnt play was in the Champions league because he was inelligible .

HE SUX HE SUX HE SUX HE SUX HE SUX HE SUX HE SUX HE SUX

You all know how I feel .... but I will say this, injury or not, he had TWO golden opportunities that anyone could score on, and he blew them both. Forza ... I do not care if he has been injured for that long, but my little cousin could have put that in the back of the net. That says everything about how good he is .... or ..... how good he is not. But unfortunately, Juve will never transfer him. The Italian press have already dubbed him as the "Crown Prince of Calico" and unlike his previous Juventus superstar striker, Baggio (remember him??), Del Piero will not suffer the same fate, even though he deserves it more than Baggio ever did. And I am glad Juve will keep him (GET WELL RONALDO!!) becuase as someone who is an Inter follower, I would love to see "El Magnifique" come back and lead Inter to at least a Scudetto.

Woody: Don't you dare and compare our best forward in the last 20 years to that hyped up media-creature.

As Platini compared Zidane to Maradona (which at least makes some sense), you can say the same about these 2: what Del Piero does with the ball, Baggio did with an orange.

Zambrotta .... I would never do that .... and if that is the impression I gave ... I am sorry. I was merely pointing out that because Del Piero is loved in the media, he will never suffer the same fate Baggio did, even though he deserves it more. Baggio is better than Del Piero could ever hope to be. And please .... I like oranges, insult cauliflower or brocolli. Yuk.

Keeping in spirit with the original subject, I think you are being entirely unfair to Del Pierro...was it HIS fault that France scored 2 goals against Italy? If you watch the 2 French goals, you will see that Del Pierro was nowhere even near the ball...
The first French goal can be attributed to BAD clearance...the 2nd French goal can be attributed to Trezeguet (and whoever it was that passed the ball to him)...
Give Del Pierro a break...you cannot blame one man...

Zambrotta, I'm totally with you Baggio along with Romario and Stoichov were the striking stars of WC 94. He single handedly led his team to the final.

Has Del Piero ever lead a team for 20 minutes besides matches against Verona?

Comparing Baggio and Del Piero is like comparing Ferarri and Chevette, it just doesnt make sense.

Lets see Baggio better dribbler, passer shooter etc. So he missed one penalty shot, he scored dozens of magic goals. I'd rather have the memory of tons of magic rather than a penalty (only way that Del Piero scores) that i can see Dennis Irwin do every week.

Voltaire: del Piero had to close the match, he had 2 brilliant chances and missed both. These are the facts. With a 2-0 or 3-0 at the 93rd, guess how it would have ended.

if it was robbi baggio instead of delpiero italy would've been champions!!

Voltaire. It is Del Piero's fault that France scored two. And please tell me how I am being unfair to Del Piero. Here is an over-rated "striker" who just signs a deal for 70 thousand Sterling a week. He gets two golden chances that anyone from Ambrosini to Zidane would put in the net with a blindfold on and effectively seal the match, yet he misses twice. If he scores, the last four minutes are garbage time. So what if Wiltord scores. It is 2-1, or 3-1. France scores ONE goal. Yet he misses both, and France win 2-1. See the logic?? Italy's biggest mistake was playing him instead of Inzaghi, or subbing out Delvecchio in the first place.

Too bad about Robbie Baggio. The best striker Italy had last decade, and will forever be remembered for his penalty miss in WC 94, not the fact that he pratically carried Italy there in the first place.

Pardon me, but Del Pierro is not the only one who missed goals for Italy...if you watch the first half, Delvecchio (or Totti) had an even closer shot that he could have easily volleyed the ball in past Barthez (who was way out of position to stop any ball) but instead, he doesn't even shoot on target (he made a rather pathetic attempt at goal which went out for a goalkick)...at least Del Pierro's shots went AT the goal...
It isn't Del Pierro's fault that Pessoto (or Cannavero, whoever it was) FAILED to clear the ball from Waltid (whoever that French guy was)...if he would have just cleared it, it would have remained Italy-1, France-0...GET THE LOGIC?...at least Del Pierro continued shooting on target...the Italian defense just got clumsy, and the whole team suffered...

Polish

i thought Dugarry played well aswell BUT many times he gave the ball away when he tried something fancy instead of giving the ball off simply....but he is a very skillful player which surprised me....

and all these people saying Del Piero isnt the player he used to and give him chance to recover....i think thats what everyones point is that until he is at the top of his form again then he shouldne be in the Italian team.
It doenst matter what potential a player has, it only matters when they start showing this potential and then they get the recognition they deserve

I reckon Del Piero is not a bad player in lack of confidence. If he didn't make 2-0 against France, maybe we should give credit to Barthez a little bit...
And if he is not wanted in Juv, a lot of team would love to have him such as PSG, or any premierleague for that matter.

voltaire - del piero's FIRST golden chance he DID NOT GET ON GOAL. he put the ball wide to his left, not coming close to the net (which was infinitely harder than not scoring in the first place).
sure, there were other chances for italy, however, the best two chances went to the (alleged) best stiker in the world, del piero. he made a meal of both of them. he cost italy the title. if you cannot see this, then it is obvious that you cannot watch the game with a football mind, only your heart.
here are two guotes from del piero:
"i am gutted by what happened. I know that I should've scored at least one and that if
I'd taken one of them the outcome of the match would've been totally changed."

"But the truth is that, every time I close my eyes, all I see are the two chances I failed to take."

Voltaire ..... blaming the Italian defense that held Holland scoreless for over 120 minutes, then three days later, held the World Champions scoreless for 94 minutes is just plain stupid. The defence is the reason why Italy was in the position to win EURO 2000, so shut your mouth and do not blame them. Second, Delvecchio scored a goal, which is more than Mr. Over-rated can say. In fact, he did nothing all tournament, just a meaningless goal against a Swedish team who had no chance of winning. His first shot did not even hit the net, it went three feet wide. The second was stopped by Barthez (who deserves a lot of credit for not giving up). Totti had that chance you were talking about, and if you look at the replay, you will see two French defenders on either side of him, cutting his angle and harassing him. And who do you think set up Del Piero for his chances?? Ummmmm ..... TOTTI??? Del Piero had the ball for so long, ALONE, that they could have made a movie about the space and time he had. His opportunitieS (notice: plural, as in TWO) were much better than Totti's chance (notice: singular, as in ONE). For someone who is the highest player in the world, he should have buried them both with one leg tied behind his back, blindfolded and dizzy.

P.S. - It is Wiltord, not Waltid, which shows that you have no clue what you are talking about.

[This message has been edited by Woody_007 (edited 07-05-2000).]

Well, I guess this world can't do without morons...
I do not see why you have personally attack people, but I can only assume you feel threatened by someone who has differing opinions...now, children, you have no reason to feel threatened...
Listen here, and listen well...if Italy's defense was faultless, then why did France score? Ah, think about that one...(yeah, try THINKING for once)...
If you cannot see that the Italian defense made the blunder in that game, then you are the one who doesn't have a football mind...sure, they played great, but that means NOTHING if you make the kind of FATAL mistake that they made on Sunday...yes, it was QUITE FATAL...
Your problem is you cannot stand someone standing the spotlight...who the HELL cares if Del Pierro is overrated? That has nothing to do with the Italian defense BLUNDERING in the last 20 seconds of that dramatic game...
To blame Del Pierro for losing is STUPID...it was a team effort...and if you didn't know, soccer is offically a 90 minute sport: the point being that you have play until the whistle is blown (ONE mistake can KILL you) (but since you don't play soccer/football, I won't hold that against you)...

By the way, what does spelling that guy's nam e correctly have anything to do about knowing what soccer is? I apologizing for mispelling his name...however, I apologize to his family, not to your stupid *ss...

Tell me something, if Defense was Italy's forte, then that defender should have been able to clear that ball out from Wxkdlsider (you like the spelling on that, jerkoff?) instead of passing it DIRECTLY to him...yeah, by that, I mean he also could've cleared that (like any defender could've) with a blindfold and a ball/chain attached to both legs...

Think SOCCER...it's a sport that involves both defense and offense...if you didn't know that soccer was a team effort, then I suggest you try tennis...cheers, sucker...

Kagey,
Find a quote from any of the Italian defenders, and you will also see hints of guilt (Pessotto and Cannavero especially)...in fact, the whole team feels guilty...your excursions into the usage of quotes leaves me cold...

You know .... I had a nice long response ready for you, but I am not going to say anything. Blaming Italy's defence, the reason Italy had the chance to win in the first place, is just wrong. You have your opinion, so stick with it.

As for your comments about me, I could care less. You know nothing about me, you have never met me, and quite frankly, I do not give a damn what you think. Nice to know I can try to have an intelligent arguement with you, or anyone else for that matter, and not have them resort to name calling. Very mature. Keep it up!!

[This message has been edited by Woody_007 (edited 07-06-2000).]

My sentiments exactly...

????????

NOW c-mon everyone Del Piero might not be the best player in the world but he's sertantly not the worst. I mean he gets paid heeps he also made it to the Italian team so he must still be a good soccer player. I would never put a pro soccer player down becouse if you think about it I or you will probebly never be better than him. Just think about that CRITICS.
My personal choice would have been R Boggio for the Italian team even though he's in he's 30's he's still one of the best players around, he has lots of skill & is Del Piero's IDOL. it's true. he's about as old as Maldini & isn't much differnt to him exepet for the position that they play.
If he were in the team up front with Vieri which is a young powerful striker & Del Piero I think Itly would kick soms serios ass

RIK

All you people that criticise Del Piero can go get ****ed......you, like all those wankers in the Italian media and sporting circles, have a problem where someone needs to be blamed, and because Del Piero made the only mistakes he made in the whole tournament in the final, you say its all his fault. We seem to forget that Cannavaro missed the ball with his head and it went through to Wiltord, but lets not let the truth get in the way of a good Del Piero bashing. Go **** off the lot of you. If you think its right to give a verbal beating to a player that lacked match fitness, and was unfairly called upon in the final of the tournament to win it for Italy (when he had only played one full match since the end of serie A) then go right ahead, but it only goes to show that you people know absolutely nothing about soccer, and just wanna go along with every other ****head to make yourself look better. Once again, you guys can all get ****ed.