EURO 2016 THREAD

[ReiseReise]

Netherlands salvaged one point in a match where they looked very uninspired. Turkey has to be heartbroken (and questioning a six minute Fergie-time at the end) while I can see a major discussion regarding Hiddink in the upcoming days. Some surprises like the Czechs drawing Latvia at home, much like the Dutch with a very very late goal to equalize and Italy drawing Bulgaria in Sofia after another late equalizer in today´s matches. Wales battering Israel in their away match was quite unexpected for me aswell, Israel seemed to be on form in those qualifiers so far.

 

Meanwhile, Iceland continues their good campaign with an easy 3-0 win in Kazakhstan, Belgium thumps Cyprus 5-0 aswell as Croatia crushes Norway 5-1.

Interested in tomorrow´s Germany match.

 

After winning the World Cup, people speculated if this may lead to an area where our team dominates international football. I guess after the underwhelming games in the qualifiers, those speculations are out of the window. It will be interesting to see how the team fares with all the key players who were injured / rested in the first four games aboard. From the talk, everybody knows there´s not much room for any other slip ups now. Happy we get the early match (18 c,e.t.) tomorrow...for some odd reason I just don´t like late matches on Sundays.

[Death From Above]

Italy looked pretty bad though they really should have won anyway. Bulgaria's not very good and really ran out of gas at the finish line though they took both their goals well and deserve credit for taking what few chances they had to make something out of it, and they kept Italy under pressure in that rope-a-dope way until the last 5 minutes or so. But obviously all the guys the Italians were missing hurt them a lot. Italian midfield was kind of a mess on the day.

 

I only caught the last few minutes of Croatia/Norway and that was enough to see two Croatia goals. Apparently it was tied at the half, but Norway must have really come apart in the second half.

[Guest Edwin]

Germany beat Georgia 0-2 in a qualifying match, but they didn't look that great in victory.

[ReiseReise]

I really think they looked as good as one could expect, to be honest. They dominated the game and never looked to be in any danger, could have been easily up by five goals after the first half. Then it was the usual shitty administrative possession footie after the break you get from our team in most qualifiers. Still could have gotten two or three more goals. 

The games against Scotland, Ireland and Poland will be those who will tell most about the German quality. Up until then we should really start making more out of our chances.

[Death From Above]

GIBRALTER SCORED

 

Scotland still won by a million, but hey.

[Cobra Commander]

so, how will UEFA mess up the Montenegro game punishment?

 

You can read the UEFA discipline log if you wanna lose confidence in parts of Europe. Pretty much half the punishments include charges of throwing fireworks and the other half of charges involve racism.

[Cobra Commander]

And both sides got charged with throwing stuff. Fun!

[ReiseReise]

So, Croatian crowd was excluded from their home game against Italy because of racist slurs and the like before. Somehow somebody was able to put a Swastika into the grass on the pitch, according to the Croatian federation between 24 or 48 hours before kickoff. THOSE are the instances were I think football fans kind of deserve a scumbag organization like FIFA to rule the game on the world stage, since we still haven´t gotten rid of those kind of idiots.

[Dewar]

I'd toss Croatia from Euro 2016 qualifying for this.

[ReiseReise]

Germany won their away game against Gibraltar 7-0, but especially the first half was horrible to watch with almost everyone pretty much in holiday mode for Die Mannschaft , luckily goalkeeper Weidenfeller (in probably his farewell game) was awake and saved some attempts quite well. There should have probably been at least one goal in the match for Gibraltar, had they taken their chances better, A lot of German players really didn´t look motivated at all for about 30 minutes, especially well established internationals like Schweinsteiger and Goetze were horrendous. The latter had to be subbed off with an injury, Kruse was brought on and the Germans got better afterwards, with the Gibraltarian keeper Perez having a field day. After the break the underdogs seem to tire fast and Germany seemed to realize how bad the first half was, there was a little more urgency and the goals kept coming. Even then, the 3 at the back once more looked very shaky and at this rate, it´s hardly an alternative. Schuerrle might work as a striker, hard to tell from this match, he is the right type of player for that position though. Bellarabi I will probably never be sold on, sorry. I really just don´t like this player type.

[SirFozzie]

Greece loses to the Faroe Islands.. again.

 

How far hath the "mighty" fallen.

Quick Edit: Faroe Islands has six points, all from games against Greece, who have a mere 2 points from their six games

[Zheroen]

And yet, Greece has won more major senior-level International tournaments in the last 50 years than England.

[SirFozzie]

and yet the English economy isn't a black hole like Greece

[Death From Above]

And yet, Greece has won more major senior-level International tournaments in the last 50 years than England.

 

You're Dutch.

[ReiseReise]

Up until 2014´s World Cup, Greece had won more trophies in international football than Germany over a 17 year period, up until today they have won more than France over the last 15 years, more than the Netherlands over the last 27 years, more than Brazil, by that logic, only Brazil, Italy and Spain should be allowed to talk. Well, not even Spain and Italy, because until 2006 and 2008, both had been edged out by Greece for roundabout 34 (Italy) and 44 years (Spain) respectively. And I´d say, that the whole financial market in Europe is pretty f´ed in total. The bigger and financially stable countries get their stability at the expense of the shakier countries. Since we are the EU anyway, there shouldn´t even be "Greece", "Italy", "France", "Germany"-talk, but talk about a European economy as a whole. People from Germany are the worst in that regard, pointing fingers at everyone, claiming to be a financially healthy nation when all we actually do is an attempt at financial imperialism in which near-bancrupcy for other countries is a staple of our own economy. But enough of this from my part, if I talk economy, it shall be footie related...

Apparently, the Faroer Islands´ win sparked a major spike in sales of the national squad´s kit. A friend of mine is a huge fan of the island, not that big into football himself, and tried to order when online only to find his size sold out. Beforehand the shop apparently crashed.

Although I find the EURO tournament a little too big with 24 out of the odd 50+ teams qualifying for it, it´s going to be somewhat entertaining to see who seems to be making it to France so far.

[Zheroen]

 

And yet, Greece has won more major senior-level International tournaments in the last 50 years than England.

 

You're Dutch.

 

Still applies.

[ChesterCopperpot]

[SirFozzie]

This England Slovenia game is pretty choice.

[Dewar]

The Dutch are down a man and a goal at home right now to Iceland. They are about to fall 8 points out of first, and four points (potentially six, if the Czechs score a winner today) out of second.

[ReiseReise]

Iceland needs two draws or more from the remaining games to secure qualification for EURO 2016. Didn´t see that coming, although they came quite close in the WC qualifiers and have a pretty strong player-generation. Czechs basically. Of course, all this is a moot point if Germany can´t secure six points out of the upcoming two games, since that´d kill the happiness for Icelands great campaign right away... As fate determines, Reus and Özil will be out and handicapped going into the match, which is a major knock for our creativity and unpredictability. If the Germans win this, it´ll be through an excruciating grind, I´d guess.

EDIT: First half looked like a nice stroll in the park up until Poland scored out of nowhere. Since then everyone on the German team has been slacking and a Polish double chance at the stroke of halftime could have easily meant an equalizer. Tense second half coming up, I assume. Hoping our boys can string together something like they did for the first half of an hour, especially that first goal was some fine team-work.

EDIT 2: This German team was closer to what you want from a quality team, albeit there were phases were the squad seemed a wee bit too shaky for my liking. Overal, great game with lots of entertainment and good football. Can is great player, maybe having the potential to handle a tricky position like fullback.

[RIPPA]

England becomes the first team to qualify with their win today

[Robert S]

"My" Austrians are also quite close to seal the deal. With 3 games to play (including a home game against Liechtenstein (in addition to away games against Sweden and Montenegro)) only one point is missing to qualify.

[RIPPA]

Northern Ireland will secure its place if it beats Hungary on Monday (and they are playing in Belfast)

[Jiji]

The Netherlands down 2-0 in Turkey. I totally forgot about them missing the 2002 World Cup, as it seems like a foregone conclusion that they're part of every major international tournament they're eligible for. They'll play the Czechs and Kazakhstan and Turkey will play group leaders (!) Iceland and the Czechs, so it's still very possible that the Dutch squeak into third place. 

[ReiseReise]

Disheartening half for the Dutch, though. On paper, they have the easy opponents, but as of now, Czechs would be through and there is a high possibility Iceland will be in about 4 hours. This might turn into a big chance for Turkey to win even those two matches. And with the Dutch form, you can´t even 100% assume for them to take three points in Kazahkstan.

Did Hiddink ruin that much as a bondscoach? Apparently, not even the new manager is helping. If the Netherlands do qualify, I can totally see them advancing far in the tournament, however...

EDIT: Iceland and Czechs are in for EURO 2016. Netherlands in serious trouble, but still with chances for 3rd place, they need some help from both group winners, though. Italy doing Italian stuff, Belgium doing Italian stuff (aka both grinding out narrow wins). Norway and Croatia will have to battle indirectly for the second direct qualifying spot.

Germany at Hamden Park tomorrow with some proper motivated Scots. Should be a pretty hot game, the first match between both had some pretty weird calls at the end, when the Germans seemed to tire out and the Scots started putting on pressure. If Germany can avoid playing like the final 10 minutes before half-time, they should have a pretty good shot. Scots need to make something happen, which will probably work in our favour, put they have always been a pain to play for German teams tbh.