22 March 2009

After the beautiful victory at the Olimpico in Rome (4-1) thanks to two goals by Iaquinta and one each by Mellberg and Nedved, Ranieri granted the team two days of well deserved rest in view of the break in the championship due to the World Cup 2010 qualifiers. The bianconeri, excluding the players called up with Italy and other countries, will train in Vinovo from Tuesday afternoon to Saturday morning.

Buffon, Chiellini and Iaquinta are the players called-up by Marcello Lippi. The “azzurri” will have to be at the Centro Tecnico Federale in Coverciano on Monday evening to begin their preparation in view of the two up-coming matches: on Saturday 28th March in Podgorica against Montenegro (20:45h) and on Wednesday 1st April at the San Nicola Stadium in Bari against the Republic of Ireland coached by Giovanni Trapattoni (20:50hrs).

The call-ups for the other countries have already been announced and involve five bianconeri, three of which in the same qualifying group (Group 1). On the 28th of March, while Poulsen’s Denmark will meet Malta, Tiago’s Portugal will play against Sweden’s Mellberg. On the 1st of April only Poulsen will be busy playing for Denmark against Albania. In Group 3, Grygera’s Czech Republic will play against Slovenia on the 28th of March and against Slovakia on the 1st of April. Knezevic is also back with the national side of his country, Croatia who will be playing against Andorra on the 1st April (Group 6).

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