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    Soccer News: Euro 2020: Verratti the jewel among Mancini’s brilliant champions

    Marco Verratti ended his Euro 2020 campaign as he started it, looking like a frustrated spectator, eager to win his teammates.

    Those don’t sound exactly like the activities of a player candidate for the tournament, but what Verratti did in between those moments of stasis he did more than anything else to define the march to Italy’s glory.

    Gianluigi Donnarumma denied Jadon Sancho and Bukayo Saka from 12 yards after Marcus Rashford hit the post to deliver Italy a 3-2 win on penalties after England’s 1-1 draw at Wembley in Sunday’s final .

    These heroic deeds led UEFA to award the blue goalkeeper the Player of the Tournament award, but there is no doubt reason to recognize the Paris Saint-Germain playmaker Verratti as the key influence on Roberto Mancini’s side.

    Attend the party in Rome

    Italy had already booked their place in the knockout stage before Verratti managed to kick a ball, with Turkey and Switzerland swept away 3-0 in a joyful Olympic Stadium.

    Manuel Locatelli, Sassuolo midfielder, was chosen in the absence of Verratti and performed superbly, scoring a brilliant double in the match against Switzerland.

    In that context, Verratti’s exit in the dead tire against Wales could easily have been a matter of minutes in the legs and not much else, but the 28-year-old made an indisputable case.

    Returning from his 10th illness or injury in 2020-21, including two positive tests for the coronavirus, Verratti was immediately in the rut. He won a free-kick just before half-time which delightfully carved out for Matteo Pessina who scored the only goal of the match.

    Full-time he led the way in terms of touches (136), completed passes (103), created chances (five) and tackles (four).

    From outcast to unstoppable

    Mancini proceeded cautiously when it came to his star maker, as Italy first landed at Wembley to face Austria in the knockout stage.

    He played 67 minutes of the 2-1 win in extra time. Even during that time, he managed to create more chances than any other Italy player (four) and completed 67 of his 70 passes, including 46 in the opponent’s half (95.7% completed).

    In the exciting and intense quarter-final against Belgium, Verratti’s workload was stretched a little more to 74 minutes.

    No blue player, not even the allied midfield metronome Jorginho, has made (89) or completed (84) more passes. His assist for Nicolò Barella’s first goal was one of three chances he created and 73 passes in the opponent’s half.

    Only full-back Giovanni Di Lorenzo has contested more than Verratti’s 16 duels, with his 104 touching another team record.

    Conquering Spain and England: two very different different challenges

    The semi-final against Spain pitted the Italian midfield against a midfield arguably even more gifted than theirs, as Sergio Busquets, Pedri and Koke teamed up with fake nine Dani Olmo to help limit Mancini’s men to an unusually low 30 per percent of the ball as the 120 minutes finished 1-1.

    Used again for 74 minutes, Verratti’s pass count dropped to 30 attempts and 23 completed, but his impressive combativeness makes him an all-round midfielder.

    Over the course of the tournament, his 18 tackles (nine successful) were more than any other player in his position, averaging four every 90 minutes. He also regained possession 37 times. Jorginho scored 25 on that metric and his 25 best interceptions of the competition further underlined that Mancini had the perfect blend with and without the ball in his engine room.

    Italy have never been more inclined to spend much of the match chasing the ball against a more reactive England, but were caught off guard by Gareth Southgate’s surprise pass to 3-4-3: full-backs Kieran Trippier and Luke Shaw combining for a one-minute opening second that blew up Wembley.

    The opening half hour threatened to escape Mancini’s men as England continued their tournament-long habit of starting with authority, but Italy gradually turned the tide and Verratti was the key.

    His eloquent plans really flourished when Domenico Berardi replaced the ineffective Ciro Immobile, meaning a fluid attack from Italy had no fixed focal point. England were fighting before Leonardo Bonucci’s scrambled equalizer in the 67th minute.

    This came after Verratti doggedly stepped in front of Mason Mount to save a diving header, but the key feature of his performance was all the impeccably judged, chosen and weighted passes.

    He slipped 118 in total, completing an astonishing 111, dragging England into distraction in his 96 minutes on the pitch.

    Verratti started in extra time looking disappointed, with the only hope that his teammates could complete a triumph that would have been impossible without him. Whenever he was on the pitch, things rarely seemed so in the balance.

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