Dino Zoff - Italy
Dino Zoff was 36 years of age during the time of the 1978 World Cup. An extremely experienced goalkeeper who always looked confident when grabbing the ball or kicking it away to safety. A side winning a corner against Italy with Zoff inside the Italian goal could virtually forget about scoring, such was his knack for predicting what was to come. Zoff’s early career was with Udinese, he then went to Mantova and then Napoli; however, he only began winning trophies at club level as he moved to Juventus in 1970. Zoff had made his international debut for Italy no less than ten years earlier, only losing his name on the team sheet in 1970 following a short loss of form at the period of his move to Juventus. Zoff displayed almost the same level of motivation as England’s Gordon Banks when it came to training and preparing for a match; his one weakness was that he did not have Bank’s shot-stopping power.

Marco Tardelli - Italy
Marco Tardelli started playing professional football for third division outfit, Pisa in 1972. Within two years, at the age of 20, he was starring for Juventus. Originally a fullback, Tardelli was switched into midfield where he formed a formidable partnership with Romeo Benetti. Tardelli quickly adopted Benetti’s penchant for tough crunching tackles, which handed the Italian side a great deal of security and a platform for launching quite devastating attacks. Tardelli was much more productive than this brief picture would indicate, in many forms he was the fulcrum of this Italian side. Four years after he would be at the height of his strength and score one of the greatest goals ever seen in the World Cup. The prominence of Juventus players, there were 9 in the squad of 22, gave the Italians a cohesion that others did not have.

Luigi Riva – Italy

Luigi Riva’s finest achievement was certainly the success of winning the 1968 European championships with Italy; he also scored in the final against Yugoslavia. He made his international debut for Italy in the year, 1965. He scored an incredible 35 goals in only 42 matches for his country and is arguably Italy’s finest striker of all time. He was Italy’s leading scorer in the 1970 World cup. He spent 13 years of his playing career with Italian club Calgari.