Champs land in SA

THEY CALL HIM THE ARCHITECT: Italy's Andrea Pirlo walks off the OR Tambo International Airport tarmac after touching down in Johannesburg on Tuesday. The defending champions will miss the influential midfielder for the first two matches as Pirlo will be back on June 24 to play against Slovakia.Photo: AFP

Reigning champions Italy arrived in South Africa on Wednesday to defend their crown after tournament favourites Spain showed off their firepower as they scored six times in their final warm-up game.
Coach Marcello Lippi's Italian squad, which includes nine of the players in the squad which triumphed four years ago in Germany, were guarded by dozens of police after their plane touched down at Johannesburg airport.
They headed off to the Leriba Golf Lodge, just outside Pretoria, to prepare for their opening Group F match against Paraguay in Cape Town on Monday.
The Italians' arrival ups the tempo two days before Friday's big kickoff when the host nation take on Mexico in front of 90,000 spectators including former president Nelson Mandela at Johannesburg's Soccer City stadium.
Italy have rarely shone since their triumph against France in the 2006 final in Berlin, but the country's football federation chief Giancarlo Abete insisted it would be a mistake to write off Lippi's squad.
"Italy are world champions, that should not be forgotten but you cannot deny that other teams have done better than us in the last few years," Abete said on the plane to South Africa.
"For everyone the favourites are Brazil, Spain, Argentina and England, but we've got great belief.
"For Italy we're talking about tradition and in big competitions our strengths show through."
But history is against the Italians no country has won back-to-back World Cups since Brazil in 1962.
Lippi has already lost key man Andrea Pirlo to a calf strain for the Paraguay game and the playmaker faces a race against time to be involved in any of the group games.
Meanwhile, Italy midfielder Daniele De Rossi says that winning this World Cup would be an improvement on four years ago.
However, the 26-year-old Roma talisman is under no illusions about the scale of the task facing his side.
Speaking to Spanish newspaper Marca, he said: “Winning this World Cup would mean improving on what we did in Germany and we will try to do that.
“The motivations are there like always when you put on the Italy shirt. We are all coming off a tough year, but we are improving.
“World Cup games are never easy. It's true, we don't have Argentina, Germany or England in the group stages, but still it won't be easy."