Italian team awaits hero's welcome

Duisburg:

The party for Italy has just begun as it lifted the FIFA World Cup in Germany on Sunday. Italy will be celebrating long into the night and day as the world champions are expected to arrive in Rome on Monday night. The Italian team was oblivious to everything but the joy of their world cup triumph as they made their way back to their hotel in Germany. At the hotel, thousands of Italian fans thronged the entrance to catch a glimpse of a team that is now second only to Brazil in terms of the number of world cup titles they have won. Some of the members of the Azzuri may be headed to other clubs or in a more unlikely scenario to the second division in light of the match fixing scandal but that was the last thing on their mind as they quite literally played to the galleries. New champions With a home coming on Monday, the party obviously is just getting started for the new world champions. Meanwhile in Italy, the magnitude of their team's feat is still sinking in. The Italians known for giving their footballing stars a demi-god status have already started suggesting alternate careers for key members of the team. "Italy was great, everyone was great. Cannavaro for President!," said a fan. "The French deserve what they got. It was a beautiful game but Zidane should not have behaved like that. I didn't expect that from a champion," he added. The celebrations are going on across Rome and every other city in Italy, but the real clean up for Italian football will come this week when a special Italian tribunal rules on the match fixing scandal that will determine just how long the celebrations of the Italians and cheers of Forza Italia will go on.