Giaccherini reveals penalty truth

Emanuele Giaccherini has revealed he should have stepped up to take Italy’s crucial seventh penalty against Spain instead of Leonardo Bonucci.

The latter made the decisive mistake from the spot in the shoot-out, after the Confederations Cup semi-final ended 0-0, by blasting his effort over the bar.

“That penalty should have fell to me,” the Juventus midfielder, whose side lost 7-6, told La Repubblica. “However, I didn’t feel like taking it and I asked Leo to have a go instead.”

Bonucci, a teammate of Giaccherini in Turin, has admitted that the movement of Spain goalkeeper Iker Casillas was a factor in his error.

“When I understood that Casillas was going in the right direction, I wasn’t cool enough,” the former Bari centre-back stated.

“I changed the way I was going to kick the ball, I tried to lift it, but you all saw what happened.

“Now I’ll spend the next year practicing penalties because I wouldn’t want the same kind of thing to happen at the World Cup again next year.”