ITALY: SOCCER / FOOTBALL - Press conferences by the Italian and Ukrainian coaches as their teams train ahead of their forthcoming Euro 2008 qualifying match

World champions Italy having stumbled at the start of their Euro 2008 qualifying campaign are aiming to get back to their World Cup form against Ukraine in Rome on Saturday (October 7). Both teams held their last training session ahead of the game in Rome's Olympic stadium on Friday (October 6). Italy drew at home to Lithuania and lost away to France in their opening two Group B qualifiers and now face opponents they beat on their way to World Cup success in Germany in July. Italy beat Ukraine 3-0 in their quarter-final in Hamburg and striker Luca Toni, who scored twice in that game, believes the Azzurri still have the same desire for success. Although Donadoni, who replaced World Cup winning coach Marcello Lippi who stood down following the triumph in Berlin, is still without Francesco Totti, he has 18 of the World Cup squad available for Saturday's match. "We know that Ukraine is not an easy team. But we know that we want to play a very good game, we want to win and we'll have to play very well to win," he told reporters at a news conference. Asked about Italy's disappointing campaign so far in the Euro 2008 qualifiers, Donadoni added: "I don't think about the points that Italy did not score, I think about the points that we need to do in the future. Tomorrow is an opportunity to score points. That's what we are thinking about." Italy currently lie sixth out of seven teams with one point from two matches, five points behind joint leaders France and Scotland. "(Italy's) players have done four or five games (in the Italian domestic leagues) since he national team game against France. Having played more, their physical shape has improved accordingly. Not all of them are in top condition, that's true, but we are surely a better team than a month," Donadoni said. Totti has taken a break from the national side while he attempts to get back to full fitness but Alessandro Del Piero, playing in Serie B with Juventus, returns along with Toni. The pair could start in attack while in defence an injury to left-back Fabio Grosso means that Barcelona's Gianluca Zambrotta is likely to switch flanks to left-back. Ukrainian coach Oleg Blokhin has confirmed in Rome that striker Andriy Shevchenko, well known to the Italians after his seven seasons in Serie A with AC Milan, is suffering from a high temperature and will miss the match. "Andriy Shevchenko will not play tomorrow. He has strong temperature and it has not come down. We don't yet if he will play against Scotland," Blokhin told reporters at a news conference ahead of his team's training. The coach believes his side can do better than they managed at the World Cup when Ukraine's 3-0 defeat against Italy allowed Italians into the semi-finals. "We realise that we are going to play against a very strong team but we came here to fight for victory," he said. Shevchenko stayed behind in Kiev while the national squad flew to Italy for their weekend Euro 2008 qualifying match. Television station 1+1 quoted team officials as saying that the Chelsea player had a "worrying" condition with a temperature of 39 degrees. Ukraine won their opening match in the qualifying tournament, defeating Georgia 3-2. They took part for the first time in the World Cup in Germany and were eliminated 3-0 by Italy in the quarter-finals. Oleg Blokhin's side has been hit by a rash of injuries, most recently to Serhiy Rebrov and Ruslan Rotan of Dynamo Kiev.

ITN Source | October 8, 2006

Tags:. .injury. .aiming. .although. .replaced. .lie