like you said about Italy when Pirlo retires Italy will, Zidane retired and France have become the laughing stock of international football since the 2010 WC with the rifts. Also about Italy they seem to do quite shit outside tournaments but always go deep in the tournaments, always dark horses plus they have a strong enough team around pirlo, strong defensively quite a solid midfield then of course theres Balotelli and also Rossi seems to be finding form again for Fiorentina after his injury problems.