7 – Filippo Inzaghi
Filippo Inzaghi is famously difficult to qualify. He is a striker with almost no discernible football skills, but with an instinct for positioning so supernaturally elevated that it makes up for everything else. Unfortunately he had a hard time bringing his full potential to the Azzurri, in no small measure due to the history of injuries that crippled him after 2002.
Inzaghi had a good early run, with an assist for Roberto Baggio in the 1998 World Cup and two goals in Euro 2000. The 2002 tournament was less memorable, with only two games played and nothing done, but he did show a blazing moment of magic in 2006, when he managed to steal a goal with only 33 minutes of playing time.
This was a man who was unfortunate for half of his international career, and underestimated by his coaches for the other half. He was left on the bench even when he was at his best, as in the Euro 2000 final and in the entirety of the 2006 tournament. But he did a very good job whenever he was given the chance, and in as much as four international tournaments. He certainly found more limits in his own career than he did in his abilities with the ball.
