Pretoria  - Italian goalkeeper Gianluigi Buffon on Friday said that the Italian side do not play champagne football and had never done so.

"If you want to see champagne football, then you should go and watch Brazil or Barcelona," the Juventus custodian told a press conference at the Italian training ground in Pretoria.

Buffon was speaking after the Azzurri sensationally lost their Confederations Cup Group B match against Egypt 1-0 in Johannesburg on Thursday night and now are in danger of failing to advance to the semi-finals.

The world champions have three points from their two matches and trail their next opponents Brazil by three points. Egypt are also on three points and - on paper - face a much easier opponent in their last game in the United States, who have yet to secure a point.

He said that the Italian style of play was about the physical and mental attributes of the players.

"We grind-out our victories. We have never played champagne football. That is Brazil and Barcelona's style, our roots are different," he said.

"We are much closer to a team like Germany than we are to the Latin countries. Germany has not had a real superstar for many years, yet they are always there at the semi-finals of the big competitions."

Buffon said that he considered some of the criticism after the defeat against Egypt unfair.

"We could easily have won the game 4-1, then nobody would have said a word. We lost and now we are being slammed," he said.

"People are also angry that we lost to Egypt. Had we lost to Ghana, Senegal or Cameroon, people would not have been so angry, but Egypt has beaten all of those teams."

The 31-year-old said that the players were not too concerned about being knocked out of the tournament.

"The important thing is that we play well against Brazil in our last game," he said.

"The failure will be if we do not play well, it will not be in failing to go through to the semi-finals.

"The Confederations Cup is really not as important as the European Championships or the World Cup. It is a competition which the coach can use for trying out new things and giving new players a chance.

"If they do not work at the Confederations Cup, then there will still be time to change them for the World Cup."

Criticism of the Italian defence unfair was also unfair, Buffon said.

"I challenge anybody to find better players than the likes of Fabio Grosso and Fabio Cannavaro. There are no better players than them in Italy or in the world at the moment," he said.

He added that the players were no longer hurt by the criticism leveled against them.

"After the World Cup the media was celebrating us, now they are slamming us. We are used to that and it does not hurt us."

The four-time world goalkeeper of the year said that he still believed that Italy could do well at the Confederations Cup.

"I think we can beat Brazil and then we can beat Spain and then we can beat Brazil again," he said.(dpa)