I've been thinking that too. Why was Pogba and Matuidi still holding after Ronaldo left the pitch instead of bombing forward which is supposed to be Pogba's specialty? What's even more glaring is they keep trying to cross the ball to Giroud despite Pepe and Fonte dealing with those easily. Then, they subbed Giroud off for a carbon copy in Gignac and tried the same thing instead of doing something different ( such as subbing Kante in, allowing Pogba and Matuidi to venture forward or using a diff approach like Martial's pace instead of Gignac's target man tactics which failed with Giroud )
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2015/16 Football/Soccer thread
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I've been thinking that too. Why was Pogba and Matuidi still holding after Ronaldo left the pitch instead of bombing forward which is supposed to be Pogba's specialty? What's even more glaring is they keep trying to cross the ball to Giroud despite Pepe and Fonte dealing with those easily. Then, they subbed Giroud off for a carbon copy in Gignac and tried the same thing instead of doing something different ( such as subbing Kante in, allowing Pogba and Matuidi to venture forward or using a diff approach like Martial's pace instead of Gignac's target man tactics which failed with Giroud )
end the 24 man tournament, go back to 16. proper tournament football from the beginning if there it goes back to 16 teams. not winning a game, qualifying from 3rd and then going on to win makes a bit of mockery of the tournament.
nothing can top the magic of the world cup though, so lets hope the location doesn't end up ruining russia 2018
nothing can top the magic of the world cup though, so lets hope the location doesn't end up ruining russia 2018
Euro 2016 Team of the Tournament (4-2-3-1): Rui Patrício (Portugal); Joshua Kimmich (Germany), Jérôme Boateng (Germany), Pepe (Portugal),Raphaël Guerreiro (Portugal); Toni Kroos (Germany), Joe Allen (Wales); Antoine Griezmann (France), Aaron Ramsey (Wales), Dimitri Payet (France); Cristiano Ronaldo (Portugal).
Golden Ball: Antoine Griezmann (France)
Golden Ball: Antoine Griezmann (France)
Is this yours or the official one
Official . As a Ronaldo hater, I wouldn't have him in it no matter what lol
I agree he had the weakest tournament of that 11, I am not sure who who would go over him though. Bale wasn't really any better, Nani, Sissoko, Hazard? I think Giroud has a case.
yeah the uefa team of the tournament is pretty spot on. bonucci or chiellini have a case in central defence over boateng, but not much in it. Lloris could have been gk but rui patricio's performance in the final probably meas he deserves it. perisic or rakitic might have been in but I suppose only if croatia got further would they have been considered, and they only really performed in the group stage.
ronaldo probably does deserve to be in it, not cos he had a great tournament, but because no other forward really did besides griezmann. Portugal definitely wouldn't have won the whole thing without him and he did get 3 goals and 3 assists leading up to the final
ronaldo probably does deserve to be in it, not cos he had a great tournament, but because no other forward really did besides griezmann. Portugal definitely wouldn't have won the whole thing without him and he did get 3 goals and 3 assists leading up to the final
Lol Ronaldo getting injured and substituted was the best thing to happen to Portugal! You have to be really happy for Eder though, what a beast when he came on. The team of the tournament looks OK. There's a few shouts in defence but nobody really had an outstanding tournament in attack so you can't argue too much! I really enjoyed the tournament though, I thought it was higher quality than the last world cup and I watched most games and thought they were all pretty good despite the relative lack of goals. Also about the format: while I think it's very clumsy I actually think Portugal winning the tournament justifies the third team going through. If all the third place teams were crap then the format would have had more to answer for.
Pretty good Euro XI team but lack of Iceland player triggers me.
this point is probably gonna keep coming up and it is probably just gonna be as annoying to me. in my eyes, portugal winning the tournament does the opposite of justifying the new format. portugal played bang-average football all the way through, failed to win a game until the semi-finals and then 1-0'd in the final. reward teams who win games, not teams who finish 3rd out of 4 teams in the group stages. i don't think anyone can really say portugal deserved to win the tournament based on their play in any game until the semi-finals. you should not be rewarded for getting 3 points from 3 games in what is meant to be the pinnacle of football in europe after the world cup.
I seriously cannot agree with this anymore. Portugal weren't punished for playing such a boring and unattractive style and were rewarded. We all lose when that style is rewarded
Most analysts and specialized football media have been saying Portugal played really well since game 1, and having watched all their games I agree Portugal has been really good. You can only blame them for being defensive in the Croatia game, but to be fair almost every team in the knockout rounds has played very conservatively, so can't solely blame Portugal. Sorry if it annoys you, and to be fair I also am against the 24-team tournament, but Portugal performing so well is the main argument to support the 24-team format, as they had really great performances in the group stage but were extremely unlucky (missed a pen vs Austria, and Hungary scored 2 deflected goals v them, also played really well against Iceland but had unlucky conversion).
So ok, Portugal might have been passive at some games in the knockout stages, but every other team besides Germany has been, so criticism there is undeserved. And they played proactively in the group stages but were extremely unlucky, they played just as well as Spain, Germany and Croatia in the group stages, and if you say otherwise you didn't watch Portugal group stage games (and if you did and think they played badly, you should rewatch them)
I dislike the four best 3rd placed teams going through because as shown, it rewards bad results.
Not to mention that later groups (C onwards) have an advantage over Groups A and B. Groups A and B set the bar for the other groups to try and beat. Case in point being Portugal vs Hungary, where the final 20 minutes or so were boring to watch because Hungary knew a drew would see them through, same with Portugal due to the goal difference, beating Turkey and Albania negative difference.
Still congratulations to Portugal, they turned up when it mattered. Massive congratulations to Ronaldo though, some might say justice for 2004. Fantastic strike by Eder, has to be said.
The French are funny. That bus was amusing to see splattered across my social media - and Sissoko's slap in the face for Newcastle. Had he been like that all season, they might have stayed up.
BBC's team of the tournament chosen by fans: (442), Lloris, Boateng, Bonucci, Williams, Hector, Ramsey, Pogba, Payet, Bale, Ronaldo, Griezmann.
Not to mention that later groups (C onwards) have an advantage over Groups A and B. Groups A and B set the bar for the other groups to try and beat. Case in point being Portugal vs Hungary, where the final 20 minutes or so were boring to watch because Hungary knew a drew would see them through, same with Portugal due to the goal difference, beating Turkey and Albania negative difference.
Still congratulations to Portugal, they turned up when it mattered. Massive congratulations to Ronaldo though, some might say justice for 2004. Fantastic strike by Eder, has to be said.
The French are funny. That bus was amusing to see splattered across my social media - and Sissoko's slap in the face for Newcastle. Had he been like that all season, they might have stayed up.
BBC's team of the tournament chosen by fans: (442), Lloris, Boateng, Bonucci, Williams, Hector, Ramsey, Pogba, Payet, Bale, Ronaldo, Griezmann.
Winning after extra time is a win, so they won one match before the semi-finals, and three matches overall in the tournament.
Robert Lewandowski was the first player to score against the eventual Euro champions in the knockout stages since Marco Delvecchio scored against France in the euro 2000 final.
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I agree with this statement. The underperformance of the bigger name forwards in Europe really highlights the fact that there's really few forwards that can do the job nowadays. They just keep churning out AM, Wingers and CM.
Why justice? They deserved it more this time than in 2004.
Btw, Southampton signed Hojbjerg for £12m, that's quite the fee for a 20 year old player. Hope he is as good as expected, he's a huge prospect and could prove one of the signings of the season.
This is 'balanced out' by the fact that winners of A, B, C, and D play 3rd place teams but winners of E and F play second place teams. still not really fair though cos it sucked for Italy+Hungary who had it tough in R of 16.
and yes, portugal did play well throughout the tournament but at the end of the day, wins matter. I don't think 3 draws or 1 win and 2 losses (Northern Ireland) deserves to go through.
2017: Hojbjerg to Liverpool for £35m confirmed.
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ftfy
But Gibraltar is a powerhouse on the international stage. Didn't you see them boss it up in the euro cup?
But they were outstanding and showed great character :-D
EDIT: Wouldn't read too much into friendlies anyway. Celtic also seems to have regressed this past few years although they somehow still make it into CL.
This was a Champions league second qualifying round match, first leg, not a friendly. Also last two seasons Celtic didn't make champions league and haven't impressed in the Europa league. Can't see them doing any better this season.
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