Euro 2008

[Ciara's Dad]

...60mins gone, and suddenly Germany are making a game of it!
That headbutt thing with Podolski is nonsense. David Silva stupid though.
Kuranyi making a difference.

 

[Mike the Brit]

But now Germany back on the ropes. Two amazing chances for the Spaniards to put the game away ...

85th minute. The Germans have lost all heart and purpose. It's amazing how quiet it is on the street. Surely they can't nick an equalizer.

Fulltime +10. Well, they couldn't. Congratulations to the Spaniards. They made a ton of chances and thoroughly deserved the win. The Germans never played at all after the first fifteen minutes. Outside my window, the fireworks are going off anyway. It's all right for them -- I've got to be up at 6!

 

[Ciara's Dad]

Euro 2008 Final
Vienna, Austria
Spain 1-0 Germany

Well deserved victory. It could have, should have, been by more. Doesn't matter anyway. Best team in the tournament won. A victory for football (soccer ). Hopefully, other nations will take a leaf out the Spaniards book, and go for attacking football.
Won't be holding my breath on that one.
Men of the match for me, Marchena+Senna+Torres.
Excellent stuff by Espana!!

Now going to round of the night by watching The Verve at Glastonbury.

 

[BritPat]

Can't believe I missed this thread until now

Spain fully deserved it, better team on the night, and the best team during the tournament. After the first game against the Russians I was expecting every game of theirs to be a goal-fest simply because their defence looked so shaky - but they've been outstanding since, and that has been as much a factor as the brilliant midfield and two of the best strikers in the world up front.

Delighted especially for the Liverpool boys. Well done Pepe, Alvaro, Xabi and Nando.

 

[Scouse Patriot]

I'll say it again, how Germany have got this far is beyond me. They were a total mess, Metzelder, Mertesacker, absolute sh!te. Those two centre halves should be fined for that performance, ************...

Torres was superb all night, the pace and power to get past Lahm is something Liverpool have been treated to all season. Made up for the Liverpool lads and it's about time that lot won something with all that talent.

 

[Ciara's Dad]

Liverpool better watch out! With European Cup money to spend and winning the Scottish league,, Celtic have over £1.5million to spend. You need all the money you can get to build your new stadium, so we'll take Torres and Alonso off your hands. Throw in Pepe, and we'll try to scrape up another £10K, (he's only a Spanish reserve FFS!).
Made up for the Spaniards.
Hail!Hail!

The Verve singing 'Lucky Man' now, Superb.

 

[Ciara's Dad]

Richard Ashcroft; singing 'Bitter Sweet Symphony'.
Fantastic!!!

 

[IcyPatriot]

I'll say it again, how Germany have got this far is beyond me. They were a total mess, Metzelder, Mertesacker, absolute sh!te. Those two centre halves should be fined for that performance, ************...

Torres was superb all night, the pace and power to get past Lahm is something Liverpool have been treated to all season. Made up for the Liverpool lads and it's about time that lot won something with all that talent.

Germany got killed in the midfield all day ... then their solution to go to the 4-4-2 semed like it might pay off. But spain stood tall and took the wind out of Germany's sales. In a way it was a great game and in another way it sort of sucked ... Germany's play was horrible. their defense kept them in the game .. defense was all they had.

 

[Wildo7]

Did any of you watch the game in Mass? I was so furious at channel 5 for cutting away from the game with ten minutes to go to give a weather update that I actually called in and left a hate message. Absolutely ridiculous. Imagine if they had done that in the Superbowl? Don't carry the second most important fucking soccer match on the planet if you don't understand how much doing that will piss of your audience. What a bunch of totally ignorant assholes work at WCVB.

 

[italian pat patriot]

great and very well earned victory from Spain that after so long time finally wins something important

they have been the best team; no doubt and also yesterday there was no game

at the end the only team Spain was not able to beat in the 'regular time' was Italy (we lost at the penalties)

congratulations to Spain anyway-they are a great team and they looks allready strong for 2010 World Cup

now let's see if Lippi returns will bring something to italian team

great performance by our referee Rosetti yesterday

 

[Scouse Patriot]

Liverpool better watch out! With European Cup money to spend and winning the Scottish league, Celtic have over £1.5million to spend. You need all the money you can get to build your new stadium, so we'll take Torres and Alonso off your hands. Throw in Pepe, and we'll try to scrape up another £10K, (he's only a Spanish reserve FFS!).
Made up for the Spaniards.
Hail!Hail!

The Verve singing 'Lucky Man' now, Superb.

These two clowns for owners are so out of their depth over here I bet they'd consider a good offer. Hicks said Torres was unavailable but I wouldn't believe a word that f'kin snake says. Gutted Alonso is on the verge of leaving aswell

Even selling Glasgow wouldn't pay for Torres though

 

[Scouse Patriot]

their defense kept them in the game .. defense was all they had.

I don't know what it was but it certainly wasn't defending. The fudementals were totaly missing, the two centre backs wouldn't even get in my local team on that performance, seriously. Lacked positional sense, awareness, I lost count how many times Metzelder give the ball away from the back allowing Spain to counter, it was like they didn't want to be there. I forget how much Madrid paid for Metzelder but anything over £2 is daylight robbery. I wouldn't touch the kid with a sh!tty stick.

The only thing that kept Germany in the game was Spain, and the chances they missed. If they could have put them away we could have be looking at 4 or 5 for Spain atleast.

 

[Mike the Brit]

I was watching on a tiny television but my blame goes to the coach.

Clearly, the Germans lost the plot in the last half hour of the first half. I think that they had some injuries (Ballack, definitely) and, after that, they lacked shape, confidence and work-rate. That's certainly not something you could have said about this team in the World Cup. Someone should have marshalled them -- if not on the field then at half time. Several of the players seemed to be at half pace and should have been substituted there and then. After that, the defenders were exposed time and again by the lack of cover and the inability of the midfield to maintain possession and exert pressure.

I forgot to add: no one could doubt that the Spanish absolutely deserved the victory, even if they didn't play an outstanding game either. Torres' goal was special, though. He reminds me of Battistuta. If he can have a career like Batti-gol he'll be doing OK!

 

[Ciara's Dad]

I thought that this was a great tournament. I enjoyed most of the games. There are always going to be some games which are stinkers, and we had a couple of them. France, Greece, Austria and Switzerland were involved in most of them. But overall, it will be one to look back on and smile. Spain, Portugal, Holland, Russia, Turkey and Croatia were the stand-outs.
The ethos of these teams was to score more goals than the opposition. It was good for football that one of them won the tournament. Maybe other teams can take a leaf out of their books.
I'm a bit disappointed to learn that they are increasing the amount of teams that can qualify for the next tournament, from 16 to 24. Not needed, imho. They say that it will give some of the smaller nations, such as Scotland, Wales, Rep.Ireland and England, a better chance to qualify. I think that the 16 team format, with 4 groups of 4 is perfect. Why dilute the tournament with weaker teams? I cannot think of a team at the moment, by whose absence, devalued the tournament.
Talking of the next tournament in 2012, Platini is sending out some UEFA reps to have a look at the venues in Poland and the Ukraine. By all accounts, there is a very good chance that the event will be taken off them if they think that the stadiums will not be completed on time. On a similar subject, the South Africa 2010 World Cup organizers are having some jitters about the stadiums down there too. That could turn out to be a blessing in disguise if it gets taken off them. I don't think we will see many fans booking up for that one. One can only guess at the backhanders, funny handshakes and brown nosing that was done to get South Africa the competition.
Anyway, tomorrow sees the draws for the 1st and 2nd qualifying games for the European Cup. Is it that time already?
I know that many fans, such as myself, will be looking forward to the start of the footballing season on the back of this tournament with a tingle of anticipation that our teams will apply the same footballing techniques and practice that we have witnessed in the past couple of weeks. For some of us, it won't take very long to have that knocked out of us!

Hail! Hail!

 

[Wotan_the_Wanderer]

Did any of you watch the game in Mass? I was so furious at channel 5 for cutting away from the game with ten minutes to go to give a weather update that I actually called in and left a hate message. Absolutely ridiculous. Imagine if they had done that in the Superbowl? Don't carry the second most important fucking soccer match on the planet if you don't understand how much doing that will piss of your audience. What a bunch of totally ignorant assholes work at WCVB.

Glad I wasn't the only one so annoyed. And that special report cut-away was just the icing on the cake followed by nearly 20 minutes total of "Severe Weather Warning" teleprompts that cut away one sixth of the TV screen so that on many plays, you couldn't see that freaking ball.

A terrorist attack or Katrina re-dux I can understand. But thunderstorms passing through Worcester County?!!!

And Americans wonder why US soccer sucks. So long as the sport itself is treated like a niche sport in the US despite the rest of the world's passion for the sport, it'll continue to be played like a niche sport with the expected results on the global stage.

 

[Wildo7]

Glad I wasn't the only one so annoyed. And that special report cut-away was just the icing on the cake followed by nearly 20 minutes total of "Severe Weather Warning" teleprompts that cut away one sixth of the TV screen so that on many plays, you couldn't see that freaking ball.

A terrorist attack or Katrina re-dux I can understand. But thunderstorms passing through Worcester County?!!!

And Americans wonder why US soccer sucks. So long as the sport itself is treated like a niche sport in the US despite the rest of the world's passion for the sport, it'll continue to be played like a niche sport with the expected results on the global stage.

It's sort of OT, but I was having this discussion with my dad, who was also infuriated by it. It just sows a total ignorance towards soccer and almost a deliberate effort to marginalize it. Soccer isn't as popular as the NBA, MLB or NFL is in this country but it's still massively popular. Yet everytime the World Cup or whatever rolls around all of these talk shows have to remind everyone that "nobody really cares about soccer" and that they "can't believe they're even discussing it as it will never be as popular as the other major sports in the U.S." Well okay, so what? They talk about tennis, Horse racing, Indy Car etc. and tons of other sports that are popular also but will never be THAT popular without feeling the need to constantly remind us that they are less popular than the major sports. I think there's a scare amongst the networks and their corporate ownership that if soccer ever really did take off it would mean less commercials and advertising, and that's why they feel like they need to marginalize the sport.

WCVB obviously doesn't have a clue when they look at their programming and see they are playing "just a soccer game" and can cut into it with their sensationalist weather warning. If they had taken 2 seconds to think about it they would have realized that there isn't a single person watching that game who wouldn't be pissed off about it. But they didn't think about it because "it's just soccer" and therefore must be unimportant. If they have that attitude towards it they shouldn't be carrying it. I'd rather buy it on PPV and have the satisfaction of knowing that I'd get to see the whole game uninterrupted, post game celebration included (which they also cut away from obviously not appreciating the significance of the game).

/rant.

 

[Mike the Brit]

You're right, there's definitely a sense of threat. And it's crazy, given how rooted in the U.S. soccer now is. It reminds me of the attitude that the Globe has towards the Patriots.

Anyway, when Budweiser became the beer sponsor of the 06 World Cup, they tried to deal with that in the U.K. by using Brad Lescargot and Hal Butchgrass as announcers. They were brilliant.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e-wA2RmTG_s

 

[Scouse Patriot]

Threat? For god's sake it's just a sport. It's not a Hitler led war machine, or Russian mind games, it's fun for all ages...