UEFA Euro 2008 Football/Soccer

Great icons. One is missing though -- the one with the english flag and red circle around and red line through it. Call it the lol@england icon.

EDIT: and brutal blow for Italy losing Cannevaro.

 

No way! That is a brutal blow indeed. Also lol@ the lol@England icon.

 

Sweden is not the only country who has trouble scoring.

Yeah, I still think they'll make it out of the group phase though and make it to the final.

 

Obi Anne you have to root for Sweden!

 

Sup everyone.

Seeing how England didn't make it, I'll be supporting the OTHER eternal underachievers this time around: Spain. Mainly because of 5 reasons:

1) I liked them as a "second team" ever since I saw them as a kid.
2) They have great attacking players who don't play negative football.
3) Cesc Fabregas
4) Cesc Fabregas
5) Cesc Fabregas

At any rate, Spain really look like they have the horses to win it. 'Course, that's what people have been saying about the Spanish for like 20 years now in every big tournament, and they crash out time after time.

Specterace

 

Or they lose in knockout stages versus France or something.

 

You're assuming France will pass the group stages It won't be like the world cup where they started slowly and peaked at the right time. They'll have to peak almost from day one and there will be little room for experiment and tinkering. Not sure if Domenech can get things right straight away

 

Spain cannot win. If they do then they'll leapfrog England and leave us as the biggest underachievers in European international football

 

Spain's the only team we've beaten on penalties for about 20 years

 

I'm going for Germany, although i'm not too fond of Jens Lehmann in goal. I'd rather of seen Rene Adler in goal against Belarus and Serbia to see how he did. But hey what can i do?

 

Okay, Im now finally getting excited for this.

Van Nistelrooy fit: check
Sneijder fit: check
Robben fit: wow, check
van der Vaart fit: check

and now:

van Persie fit: check

Yup, bring 'em on, we're ready.

 

They can't all be Oliver Kahn.

 

Indeed true

 

Spain beat the US 1-0 today in a friendly. I know that it is the US, but it's always good to have a win. Wonder if that'll give them a little bit of momentum.

I still haven't decided who to support, since Scotland didn't make it (I managed to see their rugby team in person during the World Cup last fall and decided to support them internationally). I'm open to suggestions!

 

Löw really was in a hard spot with Lehmann, he actually played well in the limited time he saw at Arsenal in recent months, and had some very good matches for Germany as well. Hildebrand has never played well in his few appearances for the Nationalelf, and Enke has almost no big game experience. Adler is unquestionably the future, but ti start him in the tournament when he's never been in an international match before would be risky.

This is all the fault of one person, of course: Lehmann's wife. Lehmann wanted to transfer to a German club over the winter, but she didn't want to take the kids out of school mid-term.

 

Are you saying football is more important than the primary education of two children?

 

I actually thought Spain played quite poorly. But so did the USA. Also Freedy Adu was the best one out there for either team

 

I didn't watch the US - England game, but apparently (at least according to the announcers), the US played better against Spain than it did against England. So, I'm not sure if that speaks well of the US or poorly of Spain...

Part of the US's problem is that MLS's season is still going strong.

 

Spain are going into Euro 2008 as pretty much the European Verison of England, they just fail to live up to expectations, World Cup 1998, Euro 2004. Which is a shame considering the class players they have.

 

Isnt't England the European version of England?

 

Well i couldn't find any other way to put it across.

 

England is the European version of Poland.

 

Netherlands all the way.