Qualification is done and dusted for the most interesting tournament outside of the World Cup. Time to start flapping our collective (and virtual) pie holes in anticipation. Host Nation: Poland and Ukraine When: June - July 2012 Who: Sixteen Teams have qualified The Teams Ukraine Rank: 58 Odds: 40/1 Held Germany to a 3-3 draw in their recent friendly but looked very vulnerable once the Krauts decided to stopping fucking around. Poland Rank: 64 Odds: 50/1 I know little about them and haven't seem them play recently. Spain Rank: 1 Odds: 5/2 World and European Champions, breezed through their qualifications but seem to turn-off for friendlies. England beat them 1-0 (for pity's sake) and they drew with Costa Rica. But always seem to get it up when it counts. Stylistically beautiful (imho) their biggest problem is that Lionel Messi is Argentinian and can't play for them. Torres is a shadow of his 2008 self (oh, how Abramovich must be cursing) and they need Villa to find his mojo. Xavi's getting old too. Holland Rank: 2 Odds: 11/2 Another team that breezed qualifying (lost one game) and scored a lot of goals. Did get hammered by Germany 3-0 in the most recent friendly. Still have the stink of a bad World Cup final against Spain which means they won't necessarily be the peoples favorites. If Van Persie is fit and Sneijder can find his form again they'll make a run at the title. Germany Rank: 3 Odds: 7/2 The surprise of the WC, they're even better now and Oesil is becoming a world class creative force. At full strength a formidable team which have great attacking flair. If they have a problem it's in defense (a very un-German weakness). I still don't think they can beat a Spanish team playing at its peak but we may have already passed that. Italy Rank: 6 Odds: 11/1 Absolute crap. A team that had the good fortune of a complete French meltdown to take the spotlight from their performance at the last WC. Still rebuilding and by all rights shouldn't make it into the knockout stage. Which means they'll go all the way and win the damn thing. Tend to do better at the WC than the Euro's they're still a formidable tournament team. England Rank: 7 Odds: 10/1 Also qualified easily while exciting no-one. The great British hype machine will be grinding into operation in the next few months which guarantees they'll be knocked out by Ukraine in the quarters on Penalties. Bizarrely they bear Spain 1-0 last week in a friendly by playing like Switzerland. Their best player, Wayne Rooney, has a ban for the three opening matches of the tournament. It will be interesting to see what Capello does if England win all three. Croatia Rank: 12 Odds 40/1 Other than Luka Modric I don't know much about this team. They spanked Turkey 3-0 to qualify and their striker Ivica Olic of Bayern Munich has good form. Could be the dark horse. I'll post the second eight tomorrow.
and btw... just for the viewing pleasure. <iframe width="560" height="315" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/zSs2yhOes24" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>
Recent German results. WC 2002 2nd, WC 2006 3rd, Euro 2008 2nd, WC 2010 3rd. It is time for them to win something. They played the most attractive attacking soccer in WC 2010. Except for the game against Spain. There will be a couple upsets for sure. It is Spains' tournament to lose and Germanys' to win. I hope they do win just for the fact that they play forward attacking soccer. Not the anti soccer, ultra defensive crap the Italians play. Not the 7000 4 yard passes that the Spanish play. Not the hack the shit out of the other team that the Dutch play. And for sure not the we are "England", we invented the sport and because of that we are supposed to win. In the backround there is Portugal and Ronaldo, the ultimate under achievers. One of the eastern block countries could surprise the whole show. Go Germany!
So, the groups are out and some pairings seem to be interesting. Group A Poland Greece Russia Czech Republic Group B Holland Denmark Germany Portugal Group C Spain Italy Republic of Ireland Croatia Group D Ukraine Sweden France England
Yep, Group B is El Morte. Spain gets the two most defensive teams in the tournament (Italy and Ireland) but they'll get out of there with 1-0 wins assuming Italy doesn't hit them on the break. England got lucky But they've only beaten Sweden once in what, 40 years? France is rebuilding and they still don't have Zidane. It's anyone's guess in Group A - Greece shades of 2004?
2 of the 4 go on. 2 wins of three games. I think Germany should manage that. I love Euros. There are no really easy groups, there is a lot of quality in all of them. Group A is the most undecided in my opinion. All of the four are able to win against each other. B is a bit bad, but Holland and Germany are the favorites to go on. Portugal is a bit of a surprise box, but I don't really give them a chance. They still miss somebody who can replace Luis Figo in the midfield. C I think spain has to get up their game, if they want to come out of the group. Italy is defensive and Spain hasn't found a real solution to teams playing very defensive against them. If England could beat them, even if only in a friendly, they are way out of form. D Sweden and France would be my guesses. England simply breaks down in every tournament for decades. The Ukraine doesn't have the quality. Their draw against Germany in the friendly was more result of Löw's excessive testing in that match, than their strength.
If Rooney is allowed to play then I'm going to say England squeak through in second. But they'll get no further than the 1/4's. Sweden seem to play better without Ibrahimovic but if he's in the squad he won't be on the bench (and he does this sort of thing) <iframe width="480" height="360" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/qmrIhrW-eow?rel=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe> I think you're exactly right about Spain and it depends on how tired the Spanish squad is. Bosque seems to be sticking with his Alonso/Busquets (or whomever) as two holding mid-field players and I think that's hurting them. Teams have figured out they can play ten behind the ball and play anti-football and hope to do what England did. I was really unimpressed with Portugal in the qualifiers. They have some great individual players but don't gel as a team. Nani's goal against Bosnia was special though <iframe width="640" height="360" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/bttjRlfxnBU?rel=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe> So, a Spain/Germany final again
On a side note the great, great Brazilian mid-fielder Socrates, has died <iframe width="640" height="360" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/H8Qlsw8FtIg?rel=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe> His marvelous goal against Russia in the 1982 WC. What an amazing team they were. RIP.
Too many mid-field geniuses and not enough Jarzinho, Tostao or Pele's up front. Plus as leaky as a broken water main at the back. Beautiful team I loved watching them and Socrates was my favorite. Who wouldn't (he even scored the winning goal for the Greeks Vs Germans). <iframe width="480" height="360" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/ur5fGSBsfq8?rel=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe> p.s. Socrates (the player) said the only team that didn't put him to sleep these days was the current Spanish WC winners.
They need a Spanish Messi to help with that finishing thing. Talking of which I watched the Clasico yesterday and Iniesta, Xavi, Busquets and Puyol were breathtakingly good. Osil, not so much p.s. But not as bad as Ronaldo.
Özil I am happy that Mourinho lost. They need a real (in form) finisher, yes. They got a great midfield.
Perhaps Llorente? Villa seems to have gone off the boil and what the fuck is wrong with Torres? His form at Chelsea is shocking. He looks like a fourth division player these days (slow, indecisive, poor choices). I don't see him being in the Spanish squad and unlike some, I think he's done as a top class player (I hope I'm wrong). Özil (thanks) showed some big limitations against Barca (as did Khedira). Perhaps Lowe has better tactics when the German's play the Spanish again? <iframe width="640" height="360" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/exwWvKZo9rg?rel=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe> p.s. How Ronaldo is nominated for World Player and Iniesta isn't is a scandal.
