In the past there was a lot of “cooperation” between teams, match arrangements, situations where odds on a draw would be around 1.50, compensations etc. Nowadays, when judiciary organs have applied more pressure and enhanced their investigations which resulted in many arrests of prominent football faces, number of such matches have definitely been reduced, but I dare not say they were completely rooted out. In that wake, one must always pay close attention to club relations.
Second, TACTICS- one of the main aspects of Italian football
In Italy, tactics and tactical preparations are much more important then in other leagues. You can say that Italian teams often look not to concede first and as their only second objective comes the actual goal scoring. In other words, defensive football has strong roots here in Italy. In modern football teams of today tactical approach as well as defensive capability are one of the cornerstones for success. These new modern football systems allow flexibility and full use of player abilities. In every moment of the game players can be rearranged as situation demands. These systems are constantly refined and improved by world’s best managers. In the end players have the most impact on the game result but only through a properly arranged playing system where they can deliver their full potential.
The best example of this idea are the results of Roma under leadership of Zeman. He forced attacking football which was attractive and fast while his team was openly offensive minded and attractive to watch. The problems would show when his team was faced with tactically prepared teams, with defensive counter attacking style to nullify opponents attack and hurt them on the counter. His strategy could not pass in Italy and Zeman was sacked.
Also, Palermo, who in my mind has an at least mid table team in quality is fighting for survival because of often manager changes, bad tactical approach etc. Complete opposite is the Cagliari team where a very well devised system and tactics brings out the best from their players (who are not as talented as some of Palermo’s players).
Italy is a special country in many aspects including sports and therefore it is not enough only to follow the usual football factors (team roster, form, stats, club situation etc..) but also these aspects mentioned above and only when we analyse all of the information available we can select winners with more certainty. Every little thing counts, and those are the things that differentiate winners from losers. That is why I invest so much time on following the events on the Lo Stivale, aka “the boot” on the football fields and around them because that is the only way to make a good result in the long run.
In the end I have to add that in my opinion only way to be successful at picking winners is by specializing for a single league by thorough research and monitoring.
[caption id="" align="aligncenter" width="175"] Click here to see Simeones results and statistics.[/caption]
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