On Sunday Italy woke up as if robbed, but no one was willing to blame that. It was with such thoughts that the country's sports fans woke up today after the bitter defeat of the Italian national football team in the quarterfinals of the "Euro 2016" championship. The Italian team, which had never lost to the Germans in their mutual duels in European competitions, was finally eliminated from the championship yesterday after 11-meter penalty shootout, wrote lrytas.lt.
"Do we deserve this? All of Europe will say - no. We were not grey, we shone brighter than the Germans, but they were just lucky," wrote on Sunday "Il Gazzettino".
At the Bordeaux stadium on Saturday, the world champion German national team defeated the Italian team after an 11-m penalty shootout and advanced to the semifinals. Regular time and extra time ended in a draw 1:1 (0:0), but the dramatic penalty shootout was won 7:6 by the Germans.
"This is the most brutal fall from the championships. We did everything right - you saw it," said Italy's football star and national team veteran goalkeeper Gianluigi Buffon, unable to hold back tears, comforting himself to RaiSport journalist.
In the penalty shootout, teams had to take up to nine shots each. In the ninth shot, Italy's Matteo Damiano's shot was saved by German goalkeeper Manuel Neuer, and Jonas Hector scored the winning goal. "All that remains is to pity Italy. There is no reason to be angry with the footballers," wrote "Corriere dello Sport", naming the main material "Powerful Italy".
Both teams had played against each other 33 times before yesterday. Italy won 15 matches, Germany - 8. Another 10 matches ended in a draw. The ratio of goals scored and conceded is 49:40 in favor of Italy. "Tuttosport" declared the biggest opinion of all Italy in capital letters on an entire page - "Pity".
"The worst part is that no one will remember how we played, what a good team we were. Only the result will remain - and that hurts. Because you cannot attach emotions and sweat to it, you cannot add all hopes, you cannot deny the opinion that we deserved victory," lamented Italian team player Andrea Barzagli.
lrytas.lt
