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maltatoday, SUNDAY, 25 MAY 2014 53 (+356) 800 737 70 Freephone: cabs t minivans t vip transport t luxury coaches t vintage buses 2138 9575 / 9921 5286 info@cabs.com.mt w w w . c a b s . c o m . m t Italy 1934: Vittorio Pozzo: 'proud to be Italian' Italy needed to win its World Cup in 1934 to show the world the superiority of its fascist regime. That was the assignment that Vittorio Pozzo got from Benito Mussolini, and the coach managed to comply with it by setting up quasi-military training for his players GONZALO ESPARIZ "I opened the letters the players re- ceived, gave them to them already opened, and they did not get of- fended. I read them to know wheth- er they had a lover or any other concerns. Those were things I had to do for the good of the team," the man nicknamed "Il Vecchio Maes- tro" (the old master), who died in 1968, said years after the tourna- ment. Before the World Cup, the Turin- born Pozzo took his men to the Alps so they could recover from the efforts they had made in the Ital- ian championship. He then assem- bled them in Roveta, near Florence, where he taught them his tactics and prepared them "for the fight." For the coach, the advantages of isolation were clear enough. "We were far from spectators, without anyone who could write serious analyses about the colour of our shirts, without the emergence of alleged internal rifts. There was just one voice, like a hammer that pounds time and again on one sin- gle spot and on the same nail over a month. The team left there united as one bloc, cohesive, determined, with one shared goal." The days before the tournament, however, were hardly easy. "The fittest man for the goal was Carlo Ceresoli. However, Ceresoli broke his arm in preparations as he tried to make a save pretty. It hap- pened right before my eyes, because I was leaning on a post of the goal where he was working. Goodbye, World Cup!" The other major setback came in a friendly against Austria a few months earlier. The Austrian so- called "Wonder Team" beat the Azzurri 4-2 in Turin and left them with many doubts. Pozzo, however, stood by his men. "If luck draws us against Austria in the World Cup, I will field the same team as today, replacing only those who are unavailable. And then we will see that the result will be different." The World Cup came, and the first-round rival was easy: the United States. "The match was not spectacular, and it did not particularly make us relieved. The US team lacked eve- rything, especially technique." Spain proved to be a much tough- er rival in the quarter-finals, in more than one sense: the match was extremely violent, as Pozzo recalled when he told of a clash be- tween Spanish centre-backs Ciri- aco and Quincoces. "The two defenders literally melt- ed into one, with a great creak of the bones. Lying on the f loor, Ciri- aco mumbled, 'Oh, my!' and Orsi, two steps away from him, gestured to me to express his relief, since he was the man who was supposed to have been caught between the two." The match ended 1-1, and the tie- break a day later saw the Italians win 1-0, with a goal from Giuseppe Meazza, against a Spanish side that was hampered by injury. In the semi-finals, the "luck" that Pozzo had invoked set Italy up against Austria. The coach did not fulfil his promise of fielding the same team he had used in Turin, but Italy won 1-0 and got through to the final. Their major goal, win- ning the World Cup, was just one step away. "We need to praise the poise and the character of our players, who withstood in four days those three battles against Spain and Austria. Those were 300 minutes of rough, even violent play, and they never gave in to either our rivals or to ex- haustion. They were driven by an iron will. They were like an injured soldier who does not want to leave either the front or his comrades-in- arms and keeps fighting in spite of the pain." The whole country, which had been sceptical after the pre-World Cup defeat against Austria, was by then enthusiastic about the "Azzurra.""The two matches against the Spaniards had heated up the atmosphere. Things were no longer like they were during the trip from Florence to Rome, when some jokers at Chiusi station re- ferred to our players as 'old street- lamps' and just scraped getting the kind of reply their stupid comments deserved. Everyone was supporting us. Everyone, or at least many, 'had known' in advance. Nobody spoke of an unstable, excessively voluble team anymore." Their last hurdle was Czechoslo- vakia. Everything was set for the triumph of the "Nazionale": 50,000 voices were supporting them at the packed stadium of the National Fascist Party. In his box, Il Duce expected nothing but a win. "The match was not played at a high level. The two teams were too excited to play well. It's the usual story. The importance of the event paralyzes your legs. The first half was an absolute blank," Pozzo said. The second half seemed likely to be the same until the 76th minute, when Czech winger Antonin Puc tried a long-range shot and found the net behind Combi, who moved late and could not produce a save. "The goal served to wake us up, it had the effect of hurting our pride." Nine minutes before the final whistle, Orsi drew off a great run and a left-foot shot to the corner of the goalmouth. The 90 minutes ended in a draw, and Italy had extra time to look forward to. "We did not go into the chang- ing rooms before extra time. We remained on the pitch, and our players looked like corpses due to the emotions of what they had gone through. 'Be strong, lads. Let's win this, you veterans of so many bat- tles', I told them." And extra time brought Pozzo's masterpiece. "There was a lot of noise at the stadium, spectators were just a few metres beyond the lines and no one could hear me. I ran around the field and approached Guaita to ask him to change position with Schi- avio every two or three minutes, so as to confuse our rivals. The trick worked perfectly." It was precisely Schiavio who, with a 95-minute shot to the far post, did the national duty of win- ning the title. Fans at the stadium went crazy, and the "azzurri" be- came heroes. "The players, with their eyes full of emotion, went to pick up the prize that Il Duce presented to them with his own hands. Days like those of preparation in the Alps and in Roveta, struggles like those in that World Cup… they are unfor- gettable. And none of us who lived through them will ever forget. Such experiences make you proud to be Italian." DPA "Days like those of preparation in the Alps and in Roveta, struggles like those in that World Cup... they are unforgettable. And none of us who lived through them will ever forget," said Pozzo years after the tournament. Photo by: picture-alliance - dpa