Frank Lampard’s decision to sign a new contract with Chelsea and shun the advances of Inter Milan was hardly a surprise.

The midfielder made a wise choice if he based the decision on the previous experiences of English players in Italy.

Only David Platt at Sampdoria was really a success. Ian “it’s like living in a foreign country” Rush lasted just a season at Juventus while the likes of Luther Blissett, Lee Sharpe, Ray Wilkins, Des Walker, Paul Ince and Jay Bothroyd hardly set Serie A alight.

Paul Gascoigne was injured for much of his time at Lazio. Rather than his stunning play, he is best remembered here in Italy for shocking the nation by burping into a microphone.

In recent years only David Beckham at Real Madrid can claim to have done well away from English shores. That’s largely because he was one of the few who dared to try something new.

I actually think Lampard would have been a success at Inter, especially playing under former Chelsea boss Jose Mourinho. The Italian champions, and Serie A in general, are crying out for a goalscoring central midfielder.

Instead Lampard will start another English season this weekend, admittedly with packed stadiums and bags of money in his pocket. Stuttering Serie A can’t quite compete with that. 

Mark Meadows, Milan

Amongst all the talk of football and footballers losing touch with the common fan, supporters in Italy are fighting back.

There have been at least four recent incidents where fans have protested against potential signings they did not like. Juve supporters failed to stop Monday’s purchase of Christian Poulsen but did prevent a bid for Inter Milan’s Dejan Stankovic.

Christian Vieri has been abused on his return to Atalanta and Fiorentina fans halted a move for Lazio’s Luciano Zauri.

Read more here.

PHOTO: Christian Poulsen while on national duty with Denmark in 2007. REUTERS/Scanpix Denmark

Roberto Donadoni has lost his job as Italy coach following Sunday’s penalty shootout defeat by Spain in the Euro 2008 quarter-finals. 

The 44-year-old seems bemused as to why failure on penalties should mean the axe. He should realise that the reason for his departure is that the world champions were poor throughout the tournament, even if they managed to sneak through to the last eight and almost the semi-finals. 

Having played in a dour Italy side in the 1980s and 90s where a 0-0 draw was almost seen as better than a 3-2 win, Donadoni is behind the times.  

International soccer has moved on from the defence-obsessed tactics of tournaments such as Italia ‘90. The Dutch and Russians among others have shown at Euro 2008 that flowing, exciting football can be played on the biggest stage.

World Cup-winning coach Marcello Lippi is widely expected to take charge of the Azzurri again. Can he change the Italian mindset or will they be left behind by the vibrant, new brand of international soccer?  

Vlog on the pitch host Owen Wyatt travels to Cadiz to bring us his view of Spain’s penalty shootout victory over Italy in the Euro 2008 quarter-final.

What is the most intense penalty shootout that you can remember? Is Italy coach Roberto Donadoni deluding himself that the world champions played well?

Let Reuters know your views.

When I go to the theatre, I wouldn’t expect to see a soccer match break out on stage.
 
And so when I’m watching a soccer match I don’t want to see theatrics.

But watching the diving, feigned injuries and other nefarious attempts to fool the referee when Spain played against Italy in the quarter-finals made me wish both teams could somehow be eliminated.
 
It’s a beautiful game, but it was bad theatre and worse soccer. It was the first match of the tournament that I stopped watching after a while because the acting was putting me off.
 
Italy’s Luca Toni might be tall and intimidating when he runs towards the goal — and a likeable player at Bayern Munich — but several times it looked like it only took a gentle breeze to topple him in Vienna.

Spain’s David Villa later got a yellow card for diving in the penalty area but he was by no means the only player to hit the ground hard after the slightest contact.

German referee Herbert Fandel deserves credit for seeing through it all. Sure, he might have failed to award a penalty in the first half for Spain but really it’s like the little boy who cried wolf. After a while you assume everything is an act.

My favourite moment of the tournament? Ruud van Nistelrooy staying on his feet against Italy despite being tripped by Italy’s goalkeeper Gianluigi Buffon in the 18th minute. The score was still 0-0 and he could have fallen and got the penalty as the ball rolled away from him. But he didn’t.
 
Similarly Eren Derdiyok of Switzerland stayed on his feet a few nights later despite a clumsy challenge by Turkey’s goalkeeper Volkan Demirel in the heavy rain in Basel. He rounded the keeper and crossed to Hakan Yakin, who tapped the ball in.

I’m glad we’ve seen more of  the Van Nistelrooys and Derdiyoks in this tournament so far and less of the Spain-Italy theatrics.

PHOTO: Herbert Fandel shows Spain’s David Villa a yellow card during the Euro 2008 quarter-final against Italy in Vienna, June 22, 2008. REUTERS/Christian Charisius

Three drama-filled quarter-finals and three group winners are gone. Spain should be worried.

Three of the four sides that qualified for the knockout stages after two games are out of the championship. Spain, the fourth, face world champions Italy on Sunday hoping to avoid completing the quartet.

Netherlands, Portugal, Croatia and Spain looked impressive in the group stages and chose to field second choice lineups in their final group games to give a break to their main players.

However, successful international football teams rely on continuity in their play, matches are spread out across the year and players get little opportunity to learn how to play with their colleagues. We have seen over the past three days that the more a team can play together inevitably the better they perform.

Germany finally “clicked” after stuttering through the group stages. Russia have improved in every game after a poor start. Buoyed by the return of playmaker Andrei Arshavin, they were worthy winners over a surprisingly lethargic Dutch team for whom most of the starting XI had enjoyed an eight-day break.

Spain’s expected starting lineup has had a similar length of rest.

Italy were poor against the Dutch, fortunate against Romania, but showed signs of improvement in the 2-0 win over France.

Will the pattern continue?

THE OPTIMIST  (Elena Moya)    
Spain’s chances of beating Italy and reaching the Euro 2008 semi-finals are better than ever.      
‘This time is different’ is the line that is repeated tournament after tournament, just before the team inevitably falls in the quarter-finals. But on this occasion it really is different, and here’s why.

1) Spain’s inferiority complex - based on four centuries of Inquisition, a fallen empire and a dictatorship that only finished thirty years ago - is evaporating. A winning mentality has been fostered by players like Fernando Torres and Cesc Fabregas.

2) They have traditionally been unlucky in tournaments, losing in penalty shootouts a few times including in England in 1996 against the hosts. This time, late match-winning goals by David Villa and Daniel Guiza have shown Spain can also be lucky.

3) Being lucky has given Spanish players confidence that last-minute turnarounds can actually happen in their favour. Spain’s tragic history - in football and in politics - is not inevitable. That’s what the players are now beginning to believe.

THE PESSIMIST (William Kemble-Diaz)
Half-English, half-Spanish — a poisoned chalice handed down by the footballing gods. Why oh why wasn’t I born half-German, half-Argentinean, or half-Italian, half-Brazilian?      

At least at this championship I’m only facing inevitable disappointment once. So here we are again at the quarter-final stage of a major tournament, where Spain usually flounder. And it’s them again — Italy.

We have great players, possibly the best midfield in Europe, and a strike force that works  really hard. Torres and Villa are the best Spanish pairing in living memory — better than Raul and Morientes or Butragueno and Salinas. 

Italy have no Gennaro Gattuso and Andrea Pirlo but can Iker Casillas and Sergio Ramos finally step up to the plate and show their Real Madrid form, can Carles Puyol and Raul Albiol handle Luca Toni?      

Will we avenge the pain of the 1994 World Cup — one of many misfortunes to have befallen Spain on the big stage — when Mauro Tassotti broke Luis Enrique’s nose and no penalty was given? Do I want this one? Oh so much it hurts. Am I confident? No.

PHOTO: Spain striker Fernando Torres listens to a question during a news conference in Neustift, June 20 REUTERS/Felix Ausin Ordonez

Having been drawn alongside Italy, France and the Netherlands in Group C, not many people would have predicted Romania would hold their own destiny and that of the world champions and World Cup finalists in their own hands going into the final group matches.

But my Reuters colleagues at Euro 2008 and friends back in Brussels — who are not laughing at me now –  will testify that I was one of the few to tip the eastern Europeans as the dark horses to progress from the toughest group at the tournament.

Victory for Romania over the Netherlands on Tuesday would secure a quarter-final spot for Victor Piturca’s side, no matter what the result is between Italy and France. A draw in both games would also see the Romanians through and there are lots of other permutations, too many to explain here.

Any team that finished above the Dutch in qualification, beating them at home and drawing in Rotterdam, had to be taken seriously. Romania in fact lost just one game en route to Austria and Switzerland. A record any top team would be proud of.

Did France and Italy take them seriously enough in their two draws?

They are not the prettiest of teams to watch at Euro 2008, but if you could package them up, they certainly would do what is said on the tin. Very well organized, hold their shape, and very disciplined. In Adrian Mutu they have a match winner and captain Cristian Chivu can control and run a game from midfield at any level.

But they are not in the quarter-finals yet and face the daunting task of a rampant Dutch team. Will Romania regret the penalty miss from Mutu that would have all but sealed their passage to the last eight? Or will they be helped by the already qualified Dutch resting a few key players?

Marco Van Basten has promised to go all out for a win. But surely meeting Romania again in the semi-finals is a much more attractive proposition than playing Italy or France.

PHOTO: Romania’s Razvan Rat leaves the pitch with a bloodied face at half-time in the match against Italy in Zurich, June 13, 2008. REUTERS/Ruben Sprich

Football is a simple game so why do UEFA make the Euro 2008 groups so complicated?

The criteria for determining the rankings of teams who finish level on points are mindboggling.

Head to heads, mini-leagues of three teams, UEFA coefficents, fair play, drawing lots and even penalties after 90 minutes are all there. Plain old simple goal difference among every team in the group is only halfway down the list in terms of priority.

Goal difference among all teams is used in most domestic leagues in the world and fans all understand it.

So why is it less important than head-to-head records in big tournaments?

Why should Romania be penalised if they concede fewer goals against Group C winners Netherlands than Italy and France did? 

Just because they didn’t score a goal against France, they will go out if they lose to the Dutch on Tuesday and Italy grab a scoring draw with the French. 

Penalties to separate tied teams in the last group matches is a fun innovation when goal difference can’t help. Otherwise goal difference from all group matches is the fairest and easiest method.

I hope Michel Platini is reading.

PHOTO: Adrian Mutu gestures during a Romania training session, St Gallen, June 14, 2008. REUTERS/Arnd Wiegmann

Italians are suspicious of everything, or so it seems. Several of my friends in Milan refuse to eat pasta or pizza outside Italy because they don’t believe it will taste the same.

They are just as circumspect when it comes to soccer.

The Dutch have already qualified for the Euro 2008 quarter-finals and meet second-placed Romania in their final Group C match in Berne on Tuesday. World champions Italy need the Dutch to get a result to have any chance of going above the Romanians by beating or drawing with France.  

The Italians are terrified that Netherlands coach Marco van Basten will put out a weakened side or the Dutch players will try to avoid injury and not give 100 percent. 

Azzurri fans already think they have been robbed by the officials who allowed Ruud van Nistelrooy’s goal in the 3-0 defeat by the Dutch and disallowed Luca Toni’s valid header in Friday’s 1-1 draw with Romania. Incidentally, that was played on Friday 13th and was the 13th game of the 13th European championship. But having said that, the unlucky number in Italy is actually 17…the date of the France game.

All this follows years of conspiracy theories which Italians have dreamt up to explain their early exit from tournaments.  

At the 2002 World Cup, Ecuadorian referee Byron Moreno was blamed for the 2-1 extra time defeat by South Korea in the second round. The Italians were convinced he was under orders to keep the hosts in the tournament. They had no hard evidence, of course.

Two years later Sweden drew 2-2 with Denmark in their final group game at Euro 2004 thanks to a last-minute goal. The result meant the two Scandinavian teams went through while Italy were dumped out despite their victory over Bulgaria. Again the Italians smelt a rat but nothing was proved. 

The fact their 2006 World Cup triumph came in the midst of the Serie A match-fixing scandal was some sort of warped fate, according to many in Italy.

This time coach Roberto Donadoni says he expects old AC Milan chum Van Basten to rally his Dutch troops. Most Italians don’t agree.

Mark Meadows, following Italy at Euro 2008     

PHOTO: Italy fans react while watching the Group C Euro 2008 soccer match between Italy and Romania on a screen at a fan zone in Zurich, June 13. REUTERS/Christian Hartmann