World Cup ’06 was an epiphany for Brother Reynell. After years of looking upon soccer as a bunch of guys kicking a ball around, Reynell came to realize the subtle intricacies of futbol. Join him as he continues his journey into the light of the game on the pitch.
The 2008 UEFA European Championship kicks off this Saturday in Austria and Switzerland. I’ve previewed the four groups and provided you with my predictions. Whether you’re new to the beautiful game or consider yourself an expert, let’s hear your opinions.
GROUP A
Turkey
According to many sources, the most coveted forward in European topflight football this summer is Nihat Kahveci (Villareal). Apparently he will be signing elsewhere this summer and has his pick of many takers. The qualifying round gave an impressive 4-1 victory over defending champ, Greece. They were neck-and-neck with Norway with two games left, and stepped up by defeating them 2-1 and qualifying by a point. Unlike some other teams, they don’t seem to disappear when facing Europe’s best. That competitive nature will bode well for the Turks and may be enough to carry them into the next set of fixtures.
Switzerland (automatic bid for being host country)
The Swiss have a better chance than fellow host, Austria, but ultimately will take a bow after group play.
Czech Republic
The Czechs will be playing without Tomas Rosicky (Arsenal), their best all around player. They lose not only shots on goal, but also their best passer and craftiest fielder. I don’t know if one man can bring a team down, but it does appear that the Czechs without Rosicky will need someone to step up. They still have a formidable goalie in Petr Cech (Chelsea); he remains their hope in stifling the skilled attackers of Portugal and Turkey.
Portugal
Definitely the most attractive pick to win thanks to Christiano Ronaldo (Manchester United). He is sweeping through the accolades, team and individual. But the soccer world is lauding over the Portuguese defense. This makes Portugal very, very interesting. If their defense can keep them in games, Portugal’s offense does possess more than just Ronaldo. Forward Ricardo Quaresma (Porto) has a powerful foot and Nani (Manchester United) is an explosive substitute who can get that late goal. One has to wonder when Portugal’s time will come because they appear on the brink of international success. They reached the finals of the 2004 Euro championship and recently had an impressive World Cup before losing to Germany in the third place game, 3-1. They have gained more international experience in this century than it seems in the whole twentieth century and only seem to be improving. If the offense can help Ronaldo with some timely goals, this may be Portugal’s time to step into the spotlight.
Moving on: Portugal and Turkey
GROUP B
Austria (automatic bid for being host country)
With a current ranking of 101st in the world, Austria is just happy to be hosting.
Croatia
Croatia capped off an impressive qualifying round by eliminating England, 3-2. I believe captain Niko Kovac (Red Bull Salzberg) was the leading scorer from the qualifying round with ten goals. Since he is a defensive midfielder, you have to wonder if Croatia has the scoring capability to compete with Germany and Poland. They did score five goals against England and four against an upstart Israeli team. Besides those games, and thirteen goals against winless Andorra, they appear to be more of a defensive team, which they’ll need against the power of Germany. Their fate will come down to how they fare against Poland, who most people are saying is a shoe-in for second place in Group B.
Germany
Germany has the tradition. Michael Ballack (Chelsea) is sure to provide some goals, especially off of free kicks. Apparently the German manager has the most experienced strikers of any other team, many of which hail from Germany’s own Bundesliga. Proof can be seen in their whopping 35 goals in qualifying. Ah – but wait just a second. Twenty-three of those goals came against San Marino (13-0, 6-0) and Cyprus (4-0), two teams who combined for eighteen losses in qualifying. That leaves only twelve goals against the rest. And out of all the ’08 Euro teams, The Germans have the most eyebrow-raising games from the qualifying round. Games to ponder: Wales 0-0, Ireland 0-0, Cyprus 1-1, Ireland 1-0 (Germany won), and a 3-0 loss to Czech Republic. Very, very disturbing scores if you’re a German fan. Besides, “firepower” flirts too much with bad luck. Shots can sail wide, crossbars appear to move, and even the most stagnant defense suddenly seems spry. Nonetheless, Germany will probably survive group play and perhaps gain some confidence going into the next fixtures.
Poland
People are saying that Poland has the “best form” out of any team in the championship. They finished a point ahead of Portugal in qualifying, but to me, benefited from Portugal’s inability to finish teams off (Portugal totaled six draws in qualifying). They did beat Portugal but lost to Finland, 3-1, and lowly Armenia, 1-0. Poland will have to make sure beat Austria, then at least draw against Croatia.
Moving on: Germany and Poland
Groups C and D coming on Saturday.
Brother Reynell-
Great post.
It will be interesting to watch as footballers adjust to playing with the teams from their home land. Many just recently finished club play. We hear all too often that United States athletes in other sports don’t do well on the international stage because they spend all their time training with their professional team.
Great to hear that ESPN/ABC will cover every game of Euro ’08.
Great stuff-looking for more!!
Have you ever watched Croatia. Croatia best scorer in qual round was not N Kovač, it was Eduardo da Silva, he scored 10 goals,. Croatia is not defensive team, they finished first in a group with England, Russia and Israel,.
I dont think that you ever heard about Luka Modrić, Darijo Srna, Niko Kranjčar, Vedran Čorluka,………
Better check your infos before starting to write nonscense.
Sorry for the mistakes but thank you for posting the corrections!
Reynell,
Great article!! Looking forward to the breakdown of Groups C and .
How did Croatia perform in UEFA EURO 2008 qualifying?
• The most consistent performers in a competitive Group E, Croatia qualified with a game to spare thanks to Russia’s defeat in Israel – news of which filtered through to the team halfway through their 2-0 defeat in F.Y.R. Macedonia.
• It was the only defeat suffered by Croatia during an impressive first campaign under former international defender Slaven Bilić.
• They began with a useful 0-0 draw in Russia and took off the next month with a 7-0 win against Andorra, Mladen Petrić’s four goals helping Croatia equal their previous record win,7-0 against Australia in 1998.
• Four days later, on 11 October 2006, Croatia got an even better result, 2-0 at home against England.
• Having scored against England, Brazilian-born striker Eduardo da Silva netted a hat-trick as Croatia won 4-3 in Israel in their next game.
• With ten goals overall, Eduardo finished as the second top scorer in qualifying behind Northern Ireland’s David Healy.
• Croatia saved the best for last, their 3-2 win against England at Wembley on 21 November 2007 confirming first place in the section and ending their hosts’ hopes of qualifying. “We are good – very good,” said Bilić.
Croatia is considered as “Dark horse” of the tournament.— GREETINGS FROM CROATIA
Franjo –
That is great stuff on Croatia, thank you. Admittedly I have not seen Poland, Croatia, or Turkey play, so I was working off of articles and reports. As you have pointed out, Croatia is in fact a powerful team (28 goals in qualifying). I did know that they had a scorer with 10+ goals and could not figure out who it was, but now see that is Eduardo Da Silva, the Arsenal striker who suffered a nasty broken leg in the EPL. I assume he isn’t playing. Do you think that will affect Croatia? And I’ve noticed many comments on how well a manager Bilic is and how much the players like him, which is always a good sign when entering a major playoff or tournament. And Bobby McMahon has called Croatia the “Dark Horse” of the tournament. I linked to his preview below
This is why I am doing this blog, so I can learn more. Please come back as much as you can and continue to provide your input. Sounds like you can be the socc, er, I mean football authority keeping the rest of us Americans in check. For anyone else looking to read up on Croatia, check out these articles:
https://msn.foxsports.com/soccer/story/8121242/Croatia's-Bilic-is-an-out-of-the-ordinary-coach
https://en.euro2008.uefa.com/tournament/teams/team=56370/profile=16/index.html
https://community.foxsports.com/blogs/BobbyMcMahon/2008/05/31/Euro_2008_Part_4_of
Eduardo injury will make a great affect on Croatian scoring capabilities, as Bilić pointed out “Eduardo will miss us a lot, but we have a group of talented strikers, and they will eventualy score when its most needed.”.
I think that everything will be now on the back of the midfielders Luka Modrić, Niko Kranjćar and Darijo Srna. Croatia is considered to have one of the best midfiield in the Europe.
They are playing attacing and attractive football, so thats why they are called “European Brasil”.
Croatia will play 4-4-2 formation and will most likely looked like this :
Pletikosa
V. Čorluka R. Kovač J. Šimunić D. Pranjič
D. Srna N. Kovač N. Kranjčar L. Modrić
I. Olić M. Petrić
I will keep you posted on the news on Euro 08.
goals from euro qual 08 croatia:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u5br9K1ZEgQ
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GocaZo3O-lI
Bog blagoslovio Hrvatsku
Bog blagoslovio Ameriku
God bless Croatia
God bless America
franjo
A warm welcome from all of us here on the Clipboard.
Not sure how familiar you are with the American tradition of honoring someone with a helmet sticker, but you just got about three from me.
I will have a rooting interest in Croatia for Euro ’08. Now if only I could take on a second language as well as you.
Reynell – you are the man!!!!
Franjo,
Additional welcomes to the group.
Please continue to preach to the choir. Like Casey, I think I am going to find myself rooting for Croatia.
Franjo,
More greetings from the Clipboard and soccer-loving Americans (yes, we do exist)!
I love to hear your perspective and knowledge- GO CROATIA!
Thanks for welcoming me in here.
I would like to visit America once. America was always friend of Croatia just like Germany, unlike the England, France, Russia and all others greater countrys. Our country is small and we are very young country ( independence 1990), but we are very proud nation, and that is the main reason for playing football with heart……… The proof of that is our results in many sports activities and the fact that we are the nation with more than a 20 football songs for cheering the croatian national football team.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EB_Lck1niCQ
above is just one of the song that we sing on stadiums
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yhMT3mdBplk&feature=related
at Wembley 5000 fans against 80 000 england fans
Sorry for my bad English.! Cheers!!!!!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TsiAwDhcXtc&feature=related
this is the correct link – please delite the one above which is wrong – thnx
more news tomorrow – when tournament starts – the Croatia will play day after at Sunday at 18 00 hrs – local time – against Austira – — – –
ESPN is showing all the games. Fixtures at this link:
https://soccernet.espn.go.com/euro2008/fixtures?league=uefa.euro&date=20080601&type=month&cc=5901
Franjo,
Is it alright if I try to sing these in my living room??
This is great stuff. Thanks for sharing!!!
Sure thing Smitty, . I will be glad if you do!
Yesterday you could see what was the bad reffeering, every croatian attemp to attack was stoped by reffeere, the croatina however didnt play as excepted, it was very poor game by them. But the most important thing that we earned that 3 point we needed so much. Croatian football federation has confirmed that they will make a complain about reffeering yesterday.
The austrians claim that it wasnt penalty, what is your opinion about that, and what do you think about foul on Olić when to one austrian player wasnt showed the second yellow card.
I must say that it was a very tought game for Croatia because they played opening match against co-host Austria under a lot of pressaure, and they played against reffeere.
Next Croatian game is on thursday, against Germany, the players. I hope the players will be at their level, and that they will show how good they are.
Greetings from Croatia.
I inviting you all to come party to Croatia, we were celebrating all last night.
Franjo –
I agreed with the penalty. I think it was evident that Austria decided to stifle Croatia near the box with overly physical play. I’m not sure which incident you’re referring to with Olic, but it may be the one where the Croatian player was literally pulled down from behind just outside the box and the Austrian was not given a card. That was such a blatant impedement of progress that I thought it would merit a card, but that would have been the Austrian’s second yellow so I think the ref purposely let it slide so as not to put the host country down a man. You have to be pleased with Croatia’s resiliency considering Austria’s attack in the second half. If Croatia was going to play a bad game, good thing it came against Austria, right?
What do you know about Poland? How does Croatia match up? I’ve heard many positive reports on Poland but know very little about them. I didn’t watch any of the Germany-Poland game.
Netherlands looks awesome! Up 2-0 on Italy right now in the 56th minute. This will be an important 3 points for them because Romania and France tied 0-0. Henry did not play (failed a fitness test?) but Anelka had some good looks – just didn’t finish any. The Italy-France game is looking more and more important as to who advances.
Reynell –
I totally agree with you, they played bad last game, but 3 points is what is count. I am sure that the game against Germany will be much attractive and better.
Poland is a first time on euro tournament. They played very well against Germany, but the lack of discipline among their defenders leaded to German lead.
Althought I must say that Germany deserved to win, Poland did however had few chances but they didnt used them. Now the very bad news for Poland is that their captain Zyrkov is injured and it is probablly the end of a tournament for hem. He was the leader on the pitch, and I dont acctualy know who can replace him. They will probablly change their tactic against Croatia and Austria.
Henry is lack of form at this time, and he is replaced by Benzema who is in great form. However France didnt today showed what they are capable to do. I think that from this group The game Italy and France will decide who will go into later stages. My bets are on Netherlands and Italy. Netherlands really plays amazing football, and they are my first favourites to win the tournament. The Italy haded their chances but didnt used them, and then we saw a super counter attack from Netherlands.
The frist goal that Netherlands scored was an offside, bad reffeering., but Netherlands fully deserve to win.
Croatian coach Slaven Bilić were criticising his players, because they leted austrians to play. Petrić has fallen in form and it is very possible that he will change tactic into 4-4-1-1 with Rakitić replacing Petrić.
He concluded that the only players who were good on the pitch were Pletikosa, Kovač brothers, Šimunić and Olić. He told the media that Modrić wasnt at level he expected him to be and Croatia without Modrić playing at level cannot go far.,. The players have concluded: We didnt played tonight as you have excepted us to do, the midfielders were pinned down during the secund half, all we need to do now is to consolidate and concetrate to Germany. The only important thing is that we have won tonight. Now is the preassure gone, and we are going onto Germany fully motivated.
What do you think about Cristiano Ronaldno?
We could not have a legitimate discussion about who is the top player in the world without mentioning Ronaldo. He possesses superb individual skills. His pretty boy image might grow a little old.
Didnt I tell you that Croatia wasnt at their level in first game. What do you think about yesterday game against Germany?
Croatia is already in quater finals thanxst to Austria Poland draw 1-1 and will play against Turkey or Czech
Franjo-
If you partied into the night with your first victory, we might not hear from you for a few days with your victory over Germany! Congratulations!!!!
Viva Croatia!!!
It depends what you’re asking about concerning Cristiano Ronaldo. As for his play, Casey pretty much summed it up. It seems like so far in Euro he’s had a hand in every goal for Portugal (one himself, and one assist to Quaresma that Ronaldo basically gave away).
Now – if you’re talking about his possible move to Real Madrid, I don’t blame him. What else does he have to prove at United? Possibly taking Real Madrid to Champions League prominence would be a new challenge for him and one he thinks can be achieved. It wouldn’t surprise me the least bit if he wants to go there.
Go Croatia! Bog blagoslovio Hrvatsku!
Reynell
You bilingual mad man – Helmet Sticker!!!!
Thank you everyone!
In the last few days we could see some very spectacular and very attractive games specially from Netherlands. I think that they could easily go into finals.
Concerning C. Ronaldo I think that he is the one of the greatest footballer in the world, but it would be a great mistake to go into Real Madrid. Thats a different style of playing, and I believe he will not adopt to that. We can see what happened to Henry when he moved to Barcelona, / Shevcenko – Chelsea, Ballack – Chelsea, and so on.
Ronaldo is in the greatest form of his life, but glory and power has overtaken him.He calim that he is the best player in the world and , (thats why I dont like him very much) but when he is under preassure, he is not efficient. He is the best in the Europe, but I think that the best player in the world is Kaka.
Croatia has announced that they will play wiht B team against Poland, because they want to rest players and they dont want that players who was given yellow card to get another one and then could not be able to play in quater finals.
Hope to see more of the good games.
Pozdravljam sve ljubitelje nogometa u Americi.
I am sending greetings to all football fans in America.
https://www.becomeacroatiafan.com/
If you want you can visit this page and becama a Croatia fan,
And now it is an end of tournament for all my favourites! – Croatia. Netherlands and Portugal.
Croatia is going home without defeat, but thats all why this game is so unpredictable and amazing.
The refeering on this tournament was awfull, and I dont mean on yesterday game, Rossetti was OK.
Croatia played better, but they didnt used their chanches, all in one cong to Turkey. As I see they could lift the trophy, the luck is on their side!
Be welll!
Greetings from Croatia
Franjo – I post a new blog every Monday. Check out the most recent on Euro ’08 here.
https://ccww.wordpress.com/2008/06/22/on-the-pitch-with-an-american-novice-euro-2008-quarter-finals/