Pellè at the 2016 European Championships (GettyImages)

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01 July 2021 On the eve of the Euro2020 quarter-final match, Italy and Belgium clash to set a record in the continental competition.

With both teams victorious in the last 14 games of the European Championships (including qualifiers), whoever wins the match in Munich tomorrow night will enter the history of the competition for the longest streak of successes, beating Germany.

This is the 23rd meeting between Italy and Belgium, with a balance that smiles at the Azzurri: 14 wins, 4 draws and 4 defeats.



The last match between the two teams was during the group stage of Euro 2016 when the goals of Giaccherini in the opening and Graziano Pellè in the recovery gave the national team a 2-0 success, then coached by the coach Antonio Conte. Thanks to that result, the Azzurri finished first in the group with 6 points, on a par with Belgium who passed as second by virtue of the direct match. Ten players from this Belgium played that match while just three from Italy are present at this continental edition. Belgium's only official match victory against Italy was in the quarter-finals of the 1972 European Championships. On that occasion the Belgians won 2-1 in Brussels after a goalless draw in Milan, eliminating the Azzurri champions in charge. 



Other important precedents are the 1980 white goal draw in Turin that allowed the Red Devils to qualify for the final at the expense of the hosts and an Italian 2-0 victory at Euro 2000. In the group stage, the goals of Francesco Totti and Stefano Fiore contributed to the elimination of Belgium which hosted, together with Holland, the continental competition. Among the curiosities: the two coaches facing each other tomorrow evening, Martinez and Mancini, were respectively the coaches of Wigan and Manchester City in the 2013 FA Cup final, won by the former 1-0 (the only important trophy of the club) which led Mancini to leave the English club two days later.



At the level of players, however, the most formidable among the opponents is Romelu Lukaku who scored 24 goals with the Nerazzurri in the last Serie A championship and in the 4 derbies with Milan he always scored the Italian goalkeeper Donnarumma. Trying to limit the offensive danger are defender Alessandro Bastoni and Nicolò Barella, his team mates at Inter. The other acquaintance of Italian football is second striker Dries Mertens, who has been with Napoli since 2013 and now the club's all-time top scorer with 135 goals. In the national team, his teammates in Naples, Lorenzo Insigne, Giovanni Di Lorenzo and Alex Meret know him well.



After the extra time against Austria, the coach Mancini has chosen the penalty takers in case the match extends up to the 11-meter challenge. Italy reached penalties in the last three finals of the European Championships while Belgium only in the quarter-finals of the 1986 World Cup, when they defeated Spain. The balance of the Azzurri on penalties is not very positive: 4 wins and 7 losses. Among the most painful memories are the 1994 World Cup final against Brazil and the recent clashes at the 2008 and 2016 European Championships, when the Azzurri were defeated in the quarter-finals by Spain and Germany respectively. On the other hand, the unforgettable lottery of penalties against France, which sanctioned the victory of the 2006 World Cup and the success with Pirlo's spoon against England in the continental competition of 2012, was positive.