Finally some good news at UEFA2008 for Italy . What a heartache it has been .Some how they managed to scrape a draw against Rumania most of it thanks to the best goalkeeper in the world at the moment, Buffon. Most probably not even him knows how he managed to save that ball. In general italy didn't play well and when they managed to get near the goal somehow they managed to squander all the chances they got.It looked like they were playing without centre forwards.

  Well today they woke up to the occasion finally . It has been the best match so far against a spent out France squad and then it was made easier by the expulsion of Abidjal and then the injury to Ribery. Italy started well and they constructed a lot of chances that somehow Toni managed sqauander . Seemed he had the fatirical iella  as they say in italy. 

THIS IS THE MATCH COMMENTARY FROM UEFA.COM

World champions Italy qualified for the UEFA EURO 2008™ quarter-finals in dramatic fashion on Tuesday as they defeated France 2-0 at the Letzigrund Stadion and Romania lost by the same score to the Netherlands.

Pirlo penalty
Romania had begun the evening second in Group C and would have progressed regardless of events in Zurich had they beaten the already-qualified Dutch. But their defeat opened the door to the Azzurri who seized the opportunity in clinical fashion, inflicting another painful defeat on France and condemning the FIFA World Cup finalists to last place in the section. The game's turning point arrived in the 24th minute when, after fouling Luca Toni, Eric Abidal was sent off and Andrea Pirlo converted the resulting penalty. Daniele De Rossi's second-half strike added the gloss to a wonderful evening for Italy, dampened only by the yellow cards for Pirlo and Gennaro Gattuso which mean they will miss the quarter-final against Spain on 22 June in Vienna.

Ribéry injury
France almost gifted Italy an ideal start when Toni pounced on Abidal's slip, only to shoot narrowly wide. Having started slowly in each of their first two matches, Les Bleus were keen to seize an early grip and Franck Ribéry twice fired efforts wide before, to the dismay of the France fans, the winger injured his left leg in the tenth minute and carried off. Samir Nasri was sent on, yet France's focus appeared to waver and Claude Makelele immediately needed to clear a Christian Panucci header off the line.

Red card
Italy looked menacing every time they broke and after Simone Perrotta had narrowly failed to collect Pirlo's pass, France finally cracked. Abidal fouled Toni as he bore down on goal, prompting the referee to point to the spot and brandish a red card. Pirlo made no mistake, expertly dispatching the ball into the top left-hand corner. The double blow left France reeling and despite defender Jean-Alain Boumsong replacing the unfortunate Nasri, the two-time champions were in disarray. Toni might have scored three in as many minutes before the half-hour, but after skilfully back-heeling Antonio Cassano's cross fractionally past the post, the FC Bayern München forward twice missed the target with only Grégory Coupet to beat.

Gross free-kick
Thierry Henry had an opportunity to raise French spirits in the 34th minute but after racing on to Jérémy Toulalan's slick pass, the FC Barcelona forward struck a cross-shot past the post. With the strikers struggling to find their range, Fabio Grosso looked to show them the way just before half-time, curling a brilliant free-kick towards the bottom corner only for his Olympique Lyonnais team-mate Coupet to push it on to the post.

Almighty roar
Despite playing with ten men, France began the second period in the ascendancy, with Karim Benzema volleying over before Henry had two shots comfortably saved by Gianluigi Buffon. News that the Netherlands had opened the scoring against Romania prompted an almighty roar from the Azzurri faithful and the celebrating continued when De Rossi scored on 62 minutes. The AS Roma midfielder's 30-metre free-kick took a cruel deflection off Henry, wrong-footing Coupet and effectively ending the French challenge. Although Benzema subsequently saw his curling shot brilliantly tipped wide by Buffon in the 74th minute, there was no way back for France, who finished their campaign with just one point after losing back-to-back matches for the first time in 15 years.

Now to the quater finals match against spain now one of the favourites to win this tournament together with portugal and holland . Well i hope we don't have to keep eating all my nails like i have done all this week maybe the least of was today. I keep hoping things will get better . Keep your fingers crossed eh. Forza azzurri

Do you ever get over a broken marriage totally? Difficult question this for me. Worth a million dollars I'd say. Speaking from my own experience ,I don't really know but looking deep inside my mind i tend to say it is very hard and it will take up a long time till all the wounds heal slowly. Nearly five years have gone now since mine and i can say that the failure still seems to surface now and again especially at the moments when i am feeling low. Time seems to distort past reality most of the time making it seem rosier and less painful then it really was so the same happens to your judgement,it becomes blurred.After so much time the answers get more complicated as they have lost the perspective of being in the moment in time when they happened when the pain was at the worst.

   I still ask why,and what i could have done differently then not to have let it happen.What did i do wrong? Was it my fault ? Did i really do my best to keep it going? Should i have made the break a lot before maybe avoiding some of the pain?The signs were there to see ,so why did i close my eyes not wanting to see the inevitable? Why was i so stupid to keep digging my own hole pretending it didn't exist? Why did i choose to believe all the lies and half truths i was getting for the questions i used to ask knowing full well that they weren't the right answers? So many things pointed to me that something was wrong but i continued to trust at first and then looking the other way not to see the obvious while i was tearing apart inside.It's because the way i am,who i am, the way i think .Could i have changed that?

How can someone who you trust so much deceive you so badly. Is it so difficult to say the truth. One says " i have had enough and i can't live with you any more" and move out.It is much simpler then keep going behind one's back till it you get caught. Then the pain is so bad it will take ages for the mind to try and heal the cracks. If it does...................................????

One month has passed now since I last have been to hospital.Time goes on non stop. There was a period of about two weeks when i was still uncertain of the way i was feeling . My mind was imagining all kind of situations and when you are in such a state you start feeling all kinds of aches and pains. Any way now i am starting to feel a lot better  .I have kept up my walking though it is getting very hot now but i try to do it in the evening as much as possible just before sunset when it is a lot cooler. At the moment because of euro 2008  and i try to see as many of the games as i can,i had to change my times a bit as the first match starts at 6 PM and then there is only forty five minutes till the next match which isn't enough for me so this last week i had to wake up early in the morning so i could get a nice walk early before going to work and when it is still cool.

        I have tried to modify my diet as much as possible . I resemble a rabbit now  with the amount of green vegetables i have been having with my meals. Hope i don't start growing long ears like them.lol. It was quite hard at first ,not that i don't like veg really but trying to not to have sweets and switching from the beautiful Maltese bread to wholemeal wasn't easy .Slowly i am getting into it . Slowly i have managed to get my weight down to just below 90 kg which is 9 kg less then i was a couple of months ago.My aim now is to get down to about 85 kg . Lots of hard work and more veg and we'll get there i hope. At least i am feeling a lot better now so that will give me the needed strength to keep going even during the hot days of summer now at the door.

What a start eh. After all the hype and the betting shops placing italy as one of the top four i expected something better. They looked like anything but like  a team who are world champions. I just hope that somehow they make it throught the group .Here is the commentary by of the debacle by cnn.

World champions Italy suffered a calamitous start to their Euro 2008 campaign as they slumped to a 3-0 defeat against an impressive Netherlands side in their Group C opener in Berne.

The Dutch were fortunate to take a 26th-minute lead after Ruud van Nistelrooy turned in Giovanni van Bronckhorst's effort despite looking clearly in an offside position.

Wesley Sneijder then celebrated his 24th birthday in style by adding a stunning breakaway second on the half-hour mark.

Italy had numerous chances to reduce the deficit after the restart but Edwin van der Sar came to the rescue, making superb saves from Andrea Pirlo's free-kick and Fabio Grosso's close-range effort.

Van Bronckhorst then completed a wonderful evening for Marco van Basten's side by heading past goalkeeper Gianluigi Buffon in the 79th minute as the Dutch celebrated their first victory against the Italians since the 1978 World Cup.

The Azzurri should have taken an early lead but Luca Toni failed to get behind Antonio Di Natale's dangerous cross while, at the other end, Rafael van der Vaart's left-footed strike forced Buffon to dive to his right to clear.

Italy replied with Toni's header from Gennaro Gattuso's cross going wide of Van der Sar's near post.

Then in the 17th minute, Netherlands should have broken the deadlock following a defensive mistake by Italy. Dirk Kuyt set up Van Nistelrooy, who got past Buffon but lost his balance and the opportunity vanished.

However, the Dutch soon made amends when Van Nistelrooy netted from close range despite clearly being in an offside position.

They doubled their lead five minutes later with a great breakaway goal. Van Bronkhorst made a crucial goalline clearance after a team-mate almost headed into his own net and, from that Italian attack, the Netherlands swept straight upfield to score their second goal.

Van Bronckhorst's long ball found Dirk Kuyt, who in turn set up Sneijder inside the area, the midfielder's first touch finish beating Buffon.

Italy could have reduced the deficit shortly after but Di Natale's close-range volley was saved by Van der Sar.

Three minutes before the break, Buffon made a fine save to deny the Dutch their third of the evening. A beautiful ball by Sneijder found Van Nistelrooy, whose strike was parried by the goalkeeper.

Italy showed more determination after the re-start and had a good chance as Gianluca Zambrotta did well to get past Kuyt but his effort went wide. Toni then fired wide on the hour mark as Italy moved forward.

Just when Italy looked to have found their rhythm, the Dutch scored a stunning third. Van Bronckhorst latched onto Kuyt's cross, after another quickfire breakaway move, before heading past Buffon.

"I'm very happy and proud with this result," said van Basten. "To beat the world champions playing football to the last minute -- it was for us a very nice game and also a historical game. We have never beaten Italy by three goals.

"If you think we were without players like Arjen Robben and Ryan Babel, the players reacted in a wonderful way. They fought like a team and if the spirit is like it was tonight, with all the quality we have, we can have nice dreams."

Italian coach Roberto Donadoni said his men had to move on and look forward. "The game started badly for us and ended up worse but it is already history.

"We made mistakes and paid for them but now we have to look forward to the Romania game, which is going to be critical now."