Italy are still in Euro 2008, but only just.

While they played reasonably well against Holland, they were poor against Romania and perhaps should have lost the match.

That said, the Italians should have gone into the halftime break one-nil up after Luca Toni's header was ruled out for offside.  However, the Bayern Munich striker was clearly onside when the cross was delivered.

The Italians would have felt even worse just ten minutes into the second half, when they fell behind after a mistake by Gianluca Zambrotta.

The Barcelona fullback's attempted header back to Gianluigi Buffon was pounced upon by Adrian Mutu and the Romanian striker, who plies his trade for Fiorentina in Italy, lashed the ball past a helpless Buffon to give the underdogs the lead.

But Romania had barely finished celebrating when Italy drew level.  Straight from the restart, Italy forced a corner and Christian Panucci stabbed home Giorgio Chiellini's header.

Both sides pushed forward in search of a winner, and the match took a dramatic turn when, with just minutes remaining, Norwegian referee Tom Ovrebo pointed to the spot after Panucci hauled down Daniel Niculae at the near post.

Mutu stepped up, but his fiercely-struck penalty was superbly saved by Buffon to keep Italy's Euro 2008 dreams alive.

The final group matches will decide who qualifies, with Italy taking on France with only the winner standing any chance of qualification.  It promises to be a fantastic game.