After losing their opening game against Switzerland at the last World Cup in South Africa two years ago, Spain might just have a sense of relief of avoiding another opening defeat and not needing to play catch up from the off at Poland and Ukraine this time round.

Substitute Daniel Di Natalie’s 60^th minute strike threatened to make lighting strike twice and Spanish fans could have been forgiven for getting a touch of deja vu along with flashbacks of Gelson Fernanders goal that condemned them to a shock 1-0 defeat against the Swiss in South Africa 2010.

Spain lined up with a different back four to the one that conceded just two goals in South Africa due to the absence of the injured Carles Puyol and now with left fuck back Joan Capedvilla coming to the end of his playing career. As a result, Vicente Del Bosque has been forced to resuffle his defence with Sergio Ramos moving over from right back to partner Gerard Pique at centre half, whilst Jordi Alba and Alvaro Arbeloa fill the full back slots.
As for the other end of the pitch, Cesc Fabregas started as a false number 9 while recongised strikers such as Fernando Llorente, Fernando Torres and Alvaro Negredo watched on from the bench. As a result, la roja struggled to make too many clear cut chances.

The Italians lined up with an expansive 3-5-2 formation, the 2006 World Champions made the champions of 2010 look shaky at the back at times. The first dangerous moment came through veteran midfielder Andrea Pirlo, the 37 year old forced a smart save from Iker Casillias with a whipped free kicked from just outside the area. Casillias was called into action again and was almost embarrassed when he spilt Cassano’s pacey shot but much to his relief, no Italian strikers were ready to pounce on the rebound.
Back came Italy minutes later; Maggio’s pacey cross met the head of Motta but only for Casillas to make stand tall again to deny him.

Italy continued to press and Mario Balotelli should have opened the scoring when he caught Ramos on the ball on the touch line, the former Sevilla defender was trying to see the ball out for a throw-in but had his pocked picked by the volatile Italian who broke with pace into the area before dwelling on it for too long and allowing Ramos time to get back to make a perfectly timed challenge.

Italy’s pressure finally took its toll when Pirlo glided past Basquets with ease before splitting open the Spanish backline with a low, precise through ball to pick out Di Nattalie, where the 34 year old showed great composure with a finessed finish into the bottom right hand corner. 1-0.

Their lead was short lived. Busquets pounced on a poor Bunucci pass out from defence before beating Pirlo to a loose ball, who quickly found Xavi before he picked out his Barça teammate Andres Iniesta on the edge of the box.
It was a perfect ball played for Fabregas’ brilliantly timed run, the ex-Arsenal man then immediately slotted past Buffon to make it 1-1.

The introduction of Jesus Navas and Fernando Torres injected more pace, urgency and penetration to the Spain’s play. Despite good ball retention, Spain had not really tested Buffon enough in the Italian goal.
Torres went clean through on goal on two occasions but fluffed his lines both times after latching onto a through ball from Navas.He attempted to round Buffon, but only to be beaten to the ball by the Juventus ‘keeper.
Torres got in behind Italy’s once again minutes later but was unable to catch Buffon out off his line.

1-1 it finished. Not a bad result for either side.