Azzurri show the other face of Italian game

BERLIN, July 10 (Reuters) From shame and scandal to fame and glory in a month -- never have the two faces of Italian football been so sharply contrasting as in the past weeks.

While Italian prosecutors and defence lawyers picked through the details of a domestic match-fixing scandal, at the World Cup Italy's players delivered the perfect reminder of why, despite everything, their game is so respected.

The technique, the flair, the discipline and the passion of Marcello Lippi's team demonstrated all that is best in Italian football and rightly won plaudits crownded by their World Cup triumph over France on penalties.

Back home in Italy though, club officials, referees and Football Federation functionaries faced charges at a disciplinary tribunal with four top clubs facing possible demotion from Serie A if they are found to have tried to influence the outcome of games via interference in refereeing appointments.

Italy's success at the World Cup cannot cancel out what has been revealed about the shenanigans of recent years and nor should the scandal take anything away from what the Azzurri achieved in Germany.

But what Lippi's 23 players did is even more remarkable given the conditions in which they were forced to operate.

Right from the moment the team got together at their plush Coverciano training complex near Florence -- where, according to the transcripts of telephone intercepts, some of the deals under investigation were struck -- the Azzurri had to deal with the fall-out from the scandal.

There were calls for Lippi to resign when his son became involved in a probe into a management agency and demands that captain Fabio Cannavaro be stripped off his position after he publicly defended former Juventus general manager Luciano Moggi, who is at the centre of the scandal.

Keeper Gianluigi Buffon even had to leave the training camp to talk to a magistrate about his gambling on foreign games.

Every news conference centred on the scandal but once the Azzurri landed in Germany, Lippi pleaded for the attention to be placed on his team and their job at the World Cup -- it never quite happened.

TEAM TOGETHERNESS After weeks of insisting his players were unaffected by the ongoing scandal back home, Lippi said, after the semi-final win over Germany, that his team had actually come together as a result of the affair.

''Certainly, initially, all the confusion that came out two or three months ago created a desire and a determination to respond, to show that Italian football is effective, real and strong on a technical and moral level. It helped to create a tight group,'' he said.

There was certainly a resentful feeling from the players that they, who have never been accused of any wrongdoing or any kind of involvement in the scandal, did not deserve to be viewed as guilty by association.

''Every time I have gone on the field, I have sweated and given my all,'' said midfielder Gennaro Gattuso when asked about the scandal.

Gattuso was among those who rejected calls from some politicians for a World Cup win to be rewarded with an amnesty for those accused of wrongdoing.

The performances of Italy's players at the World Cup surely demonstrate that they deserve better from those who run their game.

REUTERS PM PM0912