Euro 2020 Final: How Roberto Mancini’s Italy Outwitted Gareth Southgate’s England Masterplan With One Key Switch – Tactical Analysis

So Euro 2020 has officially come to an end and the Italians reign as the champions of Europe.

Across the tournament as a whole, it is difficult to argue that Italy are not deserving champions.

Their coach Roberto Mancini has removed the shackles of tradition that so often surrounded the Italian game and the result was a technically and tactically interesting team that impressed with their attacking endeavour.

For all that the Italians impressed across the competition as a whole, however, it would be wrong to dismiss the contribution of England.

With a backdrop of accusations that the English had been given an easier schedule as they played all but one of their matches at home at Wembley Stadium and surrounded by the increasing excitement of a fan base that believed they were ready to win their second major trophy, we saw an England team emerge that was actually likeable.

Raheem Sterling was reborn after a difficult season at Manchester City.

Kalvin Phillips and Declan Rice prowled the midfield with intelligence that belied their relative inexperience at this level, and Luke Shaw seemingly completed his redemption arc following a difficult period of injury and low confidence.

From a purely tactical perspective, the final was an intriguing prospect, albeit one that was possibly ruined when Luke Shaw met a Kieran Trippier cross in the second minute to fire low into the Italian net.

The English coach Gareth Southgate had acted first with a change of system coming into this match that saw England line up in a 3-4-3 against the regular 4-3-3 of the Italians.

On paper,t the systems should have afforded England a slight advantage centrally, where all three central defenders are comfortable in possession and capable of stepping into midfield.

At the same time, the Italians would have the advantage 2v1 in the wide areas.

That would have been the case had the effervescent candidate for player of the tournament Leonardo Spinazzola not succumbed to a terrible injury against Belgium.

Instead, however, we saw Roberto Mancini line up with Emerson Palmieri, of Chelsea, at left-back and Giovanni Di Lorenzo, of Napoli, at right-back.

Neither fullback was confident from the start in supporting the attack.

As such, the English wingbacks were comfortable defending 1v1 with support from the wide central defenders as the Italian attack stalled.

In the end, the early goal, and the resulting outpouring of emotion from the stands, seemed to freeze the English.

There was a sense in the first 20 minutes especially that England could have scored one or two more goals and taken a firm hold on the final.

Instead, the English dropped deeper.

They started to defend in a medium to low block, and it became common to see 11 English players behind the ball as the Italians struggled to penetrate the compact defensive block.

Roberto Mancini, though, is too intelligent a tactician to allow this to become the established pattern of the match.

In the second half, we saw the Italians make a key tactical change that shifted the momentum of the match decisively in favour of the Italians.

This is the tactical story of the match.

Italy Vs England Lineups

As previously mentioned the Italians retained faith with their 4-3-3 structure.

In Leonardo Bonucci and Giorgio Chiellini, they had a central defensive partnership that was forged in club football with each player knowing the others tendencies and movements inside and out.

The fullbacks