Lippi praises ‘lucky’ Rossi

Marcello Lippi believes former FIGC Commissioner Guido Rossi was the Azzurri’s lucky charm at the World Cup.

Rossi became the head of Telecom Italia two weeks ago and was replaced by the head of the Italian Paralympic Committee Luca Pancalli at the helm of the Federation.

“Many things have happened in the past few weeks, but I don’t really feel I can make any comments because I wasn’t there,” said the ex-Italy boss.

“As to Guido Rossi, I must say that I had the pleasure to meet a very positive person – I had a good feeling about him since the first time we spoke. He lived the entire World Cup dream next to us and it was even more exciting for him, seeing that he had never worked in this environment. Every time he came to see us we won. I told him he was our lucky charm and should have been present at every match.”

The former Juve Coach was also asked about Italian clubs’ recent struggles in the Champions League. “I read in a newspaper that Bayern’s Coach Felix Magath said that he can finally return to eating pizza in the Italian restaurants after his side’s away win to Inter, said Lippi, referring to this summer’s proposed pizza boycott after the Azzurri defeated the hosts in the World Cup semi-final.

“There aren’t that many Italian players with Inter – I think he will have to win several more games before he can really eat another pizza. Everyone seems keen on defeating the world champions, and there always are additional motivations when you play against the best. In this case Italy represent the best and that is why defeating us seems to be so important,” concluded Lippi.