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Here come the teams! Italy in azzurri blue, Austria wearing first-choice red. The Bundeshymne der Republik Österreich is played first. Altogether now: “Land of peaks, land of rivers / Land of fields, land of steeples / Land of labours, future-bound!” Then it’s Il Canto degli Italiani, with its cheery refrain: “Let us unite! We are ready to die! Italy called!” One of the classic anthems, catchy as hell. Tune, as the kids used to say about 25 years ago. We’ll be off in a couple of minutes.
A first dip into the electronic mailbag, and we pull out this letter from Justin Horton. “Am I right to recall that Italy had a similar clean-sheet record prior to the 1974 World Cup, shattered after 1,142 minutes – longer than the current run – by Haiti’s Emmanuel Sanon?” Time for me to yield the floor to our very own Simon Burnton …
Related: World Cup stunning moments: Haiti shock Dino Zoff’s Italy | Simon Burnton
