Three for Altobelli

Press, 12 June 1986, Page 29

Three for Altobelli

NZPA-Reuter Puebla Lethal finishing by Alessandro Altobelli earned Italy a 3-2 win over a fighting South Korea side yesterday and took the defending champion into the second round of the World Cup finals. The Intemazionale Milan centre-forward’s hattrick sent him to the top of the World Cup scorers’ chart with five goals from three games. His deadly finishing was the critical difference in an even but often badtempered group A game in which three players from each side were cautioned. With Argentina beating Bulgaria, 2-0, Italy fin-

ished second in the group, and will meet France in the second round. Altobelli gave Italy the lead after 18 minutes, cheekily dummying the goal-keeper, Oh Yun-kyo, and poking the ball home following a cross by Antonio di Gennaro. He should have scored a second 10 minutes before the interval when he tumbled over in the box and the American referee, David Socha, harshly whistled for a penalty against Huh Jungmoo. Altobelli sidled up to the spot with exaggerated nonchalance and sidefooted the ball harmlessly against the base of the right-hand post. Despite sustained

Italian pressure and a series of rapid but unproductive counter-attacks by the South Koreans, the score remained unchanged until the sixtysecond minute. Then, with the Italians coasting, the dangerous South Korean striker, Choi Soon-ho, scored a stunning equaliser. Collecting the ball in midfield, he thumped a right-foot shot from 25 metres past the astonished Giovanni Galli in the Italian goal. The Mexican majority in the 16,000 crowd was giving the South Korean underdogs noisy support. But the equalising goal galvanised Italy into stepping up its game and Altobelli scored Italy’s

second and his fourth of the tournament, with 18 minutes left. Again it was from close range. A freekick on the edge of the box dribbled into his path and he flicked it past Oh Yun-kyo.

But Altobelli’s sweetest strike was his last when, with eight minutes left, he combined neatly with Fernando de Napoli to slice open the South Korean defence and force the ball home at the far post Italy still had to see out some tense final moments after the Koreans, refusing to believe their cause was lost, pulled back a goal in the eighty-ninth minute. Choi, beating his marker to a cross, nodded down to Huh Jung-moo who drove home from close in. Group A PW D L F APt

Argentina 3 2 I 0 6 2 5 Italy 3 1 2 0 5 4 4 Bulgaria 3 0 2 1 2 4 2 Sth Korea 3 0 1 2 4 7 1